kinky, a. and n.
(ˈkɪŋkɪ)
Also kinkey.
[f. kink n.1 + -y.]
A. adj.
1. Having, or full of, kinks; closely curled or twisted: said esp. of the hair of some races. Also Comb., as kinky-bearded, kinky-haired, kinky-headed, kinky-tailed adjs.
| 1844 Congress. Globe 6 Jan. App. 42/3 [The Negro's] skull is as thick, his hair is as kinkey, his nose as flat..as they were the day he was first introduced. 1848 W. T. Thompson Major Jones's Sk. Trav. 146, I happened to call one of the nigger waiters ‘boy’. The kinky-headed cuss looked at me sideways, and rolled the whites of his eyes at me. 1861 in Rebellion Rec. (1862) I. iii. 137 A marked distinction is laid Between the rights of the mistress, And those of the kinky-haired maid. 1865 Publ. Opin. 31 Dec. 726 Sambo the blubber-lipped..the kinky-haired. 1872 ‘Mark Twain’ Innoc. Abr. viii. 55 With heads clean-shaven, except a kinky scalp-lock back of the ear. 1885 Century Mag. XXIX. 644 The hair more kinky, yet altogether unlike the woolly headed negro of the Guinea coast. 1925 W. Deeping Sorrell & Son xxix. 290 The hard-bitten, kinky-haired casualty-sister assisting him with critical and voiceless composure. 1937 Time 16 Aug. 58/2 Ill lay kinky-bearded, 64-year-old Thorvald Stauning, Premier of Denmark, after breaking a leg. 1956 C. Auerbach Genetics in Atomic Age 93 When a female mouse is irradiated during the second week of pregnancy, some of her young may be born with kinky tails. Unlike true mutations to kinky tail, these deformities are not inherited. If, later on, visible mutants should turn up in the progeny of such a kinky-tailed mouse, they are not more likely to affect the tail than the eyes or the ears or the coat. |
2. fig. (colloq.) ‘Queer, eccentric, crotchety’ (Bartlett Dict. Amer. 1860): cf. kink n.1 2.
| 1889 Sportsman 2 Jan. (Farmer), The kinky ones and the worthy ones who play hole-and-corner with society. 1907 E. M. Forster Longest Journey viii. 100 This jaundiced young philosopher, with his kinky view of life, was too much for him. 1929 W. J. Locke Ancestor Jorico xix. 263 A fellow ought to know something about the funny kinky ways of ordinary men and women. 1950 T. S. Eliot Cocktail Party ii. 120 But when everything's bad form, or mental kinks, You either become bad form, and cease to care, Or else, if you care, you must be kinky. |
b. Lively, spry, energetic. U.S. local.
| 1903 G. S. Wasson Cap'n Simeon's Store vi. 107 ‘He ain't over and above kinky, though, I s'pose likely?’ ‘No,..nothin' very antic about him{ddd}there must be some buckram left into him, too, the way he keeps a-going.’ 1914 Dialect Notes IV. 4 Kinky, in high spirits. ‘You seem to be feeling pretty kinky to-day.’ |
c. Criminals' slang. Of things: dishonestly come by (see also quot. 1954). Cf. crooked a. 3 b, bent ppl. a. 5 a, b.
| 1927 Collier's 23 July 15/1 ‘Why, you can't tell me that you didn't know those five big cars were kinky.’ ‘Kinky?’..‘Those cars were bent.’ 1931 G. Irwin Amer. Tramp & Underworld Slang 117 Kinky, criminal; crooked; unlawful. Said of stolen goods, or of an individual known to be without the law. 1942 Berrey & Van den Bark Amer. Thes. Slang §470/1 Booty,..killing, kinky goods, lift. 1954 W. R. & F. K. Simpson Hockshop 275 Canfield..was never accused..of having ‘kinky’ gambling paraphernalia. By that I mean dice and cards and roulette wheels that gave the house an unfair advantage. |
d. In senses corresponding to kink n.1 3 c. Of persons: perverted, esp. sexually; spec. homosexual. Of things or situations: suggestive of sexual perversion, as of certain items or styles of dress (e.g. kinky boots); in weakened sense, bizarre.
| 1959 C. MacInnes Absolute Beginners 16 Suze..meets lots of kinky characters..and acts as agent for me getting orders from them for my pornographic photos. 1960 ‘A. Burgess’ Doctor is Sick xviii. 145 ‘If you think I'm perverted you're completely mistaken. I'm quite normal.’ ‘Normal? You? That's a laugh. You're kinky, the same as what I am.’ 1960 F. Norman Fings ain't wot they used t'Be ii. i. 52 Fancy anyone being so kinkey about a brown teapot. 1963 Daily Tel. 11 Dec. 19/2 The phrase ‘kinky advert’..meant that she acted as an advertisement for irregular sexual practices. 1964 Ann. Reg. 1963 1 It [sc. 1963] was the year..that women adopted the fashionable long ‘kinky’ boot. 1964 J. Burke Hard Day's Night i. 11 She was dead kinky for sweetbreads. 1964 Times Lit. Suppl. 8 Oct. 925/1 Zoo men receive a constant stream of kinky letters. 1966 Listener 6 Jan. 23/1 One of the girls—a buxom specimen in kinky patent leathers. 1966 J. Porter Sour Cream ix. 117 On the one hand I had to trust Zinaida, on the other I knew she was perfectly capable of fabricating the whole scheme just to get rid of Katia whom she loathed. It was like something out of Greek tragedy, only kinkier. 1967 A. Diment Dolly Dolly Spy ii. 19 He produced a pack of Black Russian cigarettes, dead kinky, and tossed me one. 1968 [see kink n.1 3 c]. 1971 Daily Tel. 16 July 11/4 In a moment of excessively kinky passion a husband strangles his mistress. 1972 F. Warner Lying Figures iii. 36 Kinky sex makes them feel inadequate. |
B. n. a. A person with ‘kinky’ hair. b. An object dishonestly obtained. c. A sexually abnormal or perverted person. d. pl. Kinky boots.
| 1926 J. F. Dobie Rainbow in Morning 4 One considers the negro as a shining apostle of sweetness and light, another as a gentle old darkey, and still another as a ‘phallic kinky’. 1926 G. Thomas in Ibid. 154 The Fayette County and other South Texas ‘kinkies’ whose songs I have been noting. 1927 Collier's 23 July 14/1 A kinky, any stolen car. 1941 Amer. Mercury Mar. 349/2 The titles of every car Joe sold could be searched clear back to the factory... Yet the cars were strictly kinkies. 1942 Berrey & Van den Bark Amer. Thes. Slang §430/2 Curly-headed person, curly, curly-locks, curly-pate, kinks, kinky. 1950 ‘N. Bell’ I am Legion vii. 216 O Good Lord... Quite half of them are kinkies. 1959 Encounter July 83/1 No prostitutes, no queers, no kinkies. 1965 Punch 19 May 755/1 Palm memory of the agreeable feel of the two-in-hand will come back, and if snakeboots replace kinkies, the thrill of the double slalom round the sprigs above the eyeletholes. 1967 A. Diment Dolly Dolly Spy vi. 82 Porny photos, various drugs and birds for kinkies at Oxford. |
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Add: Hence ˈkinkily adv., in a kinky manner; eccentrically, bizarrely, pervertedly.
| 1934 in Webster. 1964 in Hamblett & Deverson Generation X 146 [The Tonups] have always been an untouchable group on their own, kinkily keen on their bikes. 1979 Washington Post 1 May b12 A spaced-out, self-centered imbecile, she finds this strange new suitor kinkily irresistible. 1987 Guardian Weekly 4 Jan. 21/5 Some of the stage pictures..were kinkily strange (such as a topless lady in a black-swan tutu trapped in a plastic tunnel). |