PINCH

Pronunciation (US):

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IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does pinch mean? 

• PINCH (noun)
  The noun PINCH has 7 senses:

1. a painful or straitened circumstance

2. an injury resulting from getting some body part squeezed

3. a slight but appreciable amount

4. a sudden unforeseen crisis (usually involving danger) that requires immediate action

5. a small sharp bite or snip

6. a squeeze with the fingers

7. the act of apprehending (especially apprehending a criminal)

  Familiarity information: PINCH used as a noun is common.

• PINCH (verb)
  The verb PINCH has 5 senses:

1. squeeze tightly between the fingers

2. make ridges into by pinching together

3. make off with belongings of others

4. cut the top off

5. irritate as if by a nip, pinch, or tear

  Familiarity information: PINCH used as a verb is common.

 Dictionary entry details 

• PINCH (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A painful or straitened circumstance

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Context example:

the pinch of the recession

Hypernyms ("pinch" is a kind of...):

difficulty (a condition or state of affairs almost beyond one's ability to deal with and requiring great effort to bear or overcome)

Sense 2

Meaning:

An injury resulting from getting some body part squeezed

Classified under:

Nouns denoting stable states of affairs

Hypernyms ("pinch" is a kind of...):

harm; hurt; injury; trauma (any physical damage to the body caused by violence or accident or fracture etc.)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A slight but appreciable amount

Classified under:

Nouns denoting quantities and units of measure

Synonyms:

hint; jot; mite; pinch; soupcon; speck; tinge; touch

Context example:

this dish could use a touch of garlic

Hypernyms ("pinch" is a kind of...):

small indefinite amount; small indefinite quantity (an indefinite quantity that is below average size or magnitude)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "pinch"):

snuff (a pinch of smokeless tobacco inhaled at a single time)

Sense 4

Meaning:

A sudden unforeseen crisis (usually involving danger) that requires immediate action

Classified under:

Nouns denoting natural events

Synonyms:

emergency; exigency; pinch

Context example:

he never knew what to do in an emergency

Hypernyms ("pinch" is a kind of...):

crisis (a crucial stage or turning point in the course of something)

Sense 5

Meaning:

A small sharp bite or snip

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

nip; pinch

Hypernyms ("pinch" is a kind of...):

clip; clipping; snip (the act of clipping or snipping)

bite; chomp (the act of gripping or chewing off with the teeth and jaws)

Derivation:

pinch (irritate as if by a nip, pinch, or tear)

Sense 6

Meaning:

A squeeze with the fingers

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

pinch; tweak

Hypernyms ("pinch" is a kind of...):

squeeze; squeezing (the act of gripping and pressing firmly)

Derivation:

pinch (irritate as if by a nip, pinch, or tear)

pinch (squeeze tightly between the fingers)

pinch (make ridges into by pinching together)

Sense 7

Meaning:

The act of apprehending (especially apprehending a criminal)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

apprehension; arrest; catch; collar; pinch; taking into custody

Context example:

the policeman on the beat got credit for the collar

Hypernyms ("pinch" is a kind of...):

capture; gaining control; seizure (the act of forcibly dispossessing an owner of property)

• PINCH (verb)

Conjugation:

Sense 1

Meaning:

Squeeze tightly between the fingers

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

nip; pinch; squeeze; tweet; twinge; twitch

Context example:

She squeezed the bottle

Hypernyms (to "pinch" is one way to...):

grip (hold fast or firmly)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "pinch"):

goose (pinch in the buttocks)

tweak (pinch or squeeze sharply)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Sentence example:

They pinch the trees

Derivation:

pinch (a squeeze with the fingers)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Make ridges into by pinching together

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

crimp; pinch

Hypernyms (to "pinch" is one way to...):

fold; fold up; turn up (bend or lay so that one part covers the other)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "pinch"):

flute (form flutes in)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Derivation:

pinch (a squeeze with the fingers)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Make off with belongings of others

Classified under:

Verbs of buying, selling, owning

Synonyms:

abstract; cabbage; filch; hook; lift; nobble; pilfer; pinch; purloin; snarf; sneak; swipe

Hypernyms (to "pinch" is one way to...):

rip; rip off; steal (take without the owner's consent)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s something from somebody

Sentence example:

They pinch the money

Sense 4

Meaning:

Cut the top off

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

pinch; top

Context example:

top trees and bushes

Hypernyms (to "pinch" is one way to...):

clip; crop; cut back; dress; lop; prune; snip; trim (cultivate, tend, and cut back the growth of)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "pinch"):

tail (remove the stalk of fruits or berries)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 5

Meaning:

Irritate as if by a nip, pinch, or tear

Classified under:

Verbs of size, temperature change, intensifying, etc.

Synonyms:

pinch; vellicate

Context example:

the pain is as if sharp points pinch your back

Hypernyms (to "pinch" is one way to...):

irritate (excite to some characteristic action or condition, such as motion, contraction, or nervous impulse, by the application of a stimulus)

Sentence frames:

Something ----s
Something ----s something

Derivation:

pinch (a squeeze with the fingers)

pinch (a small sharp bite or snip)

 Context examples 

I felt, all this while, as if my ear were blazing; he pinched it so hard.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Such caveolae may be pinched off to form free vesicles within the cytoplasm.

(Caveola, NCI Thesaurus)

In the worst pinches of the famine he stole back to the fires of the gods.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

The first was a well-known type of pain fiber—a polymodal nociceptor—that responds to a host of high intensity stimuli such as heat and pinching.

(Study uncovers specialized mouse neurons that play a unique role in pain, National Institutes of Health)

The door opened with difficulty, and the boy pinched his fingers.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

Take a pinch of snuff, Doctor, and acknowledge that I have scored over you in your example.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

But my flesh answered the pinching test, and my eyes were not to be deceived.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

This process requires clathrin and occurs in clathrin-coated pits, which pinch off from the plasma membrane to form vesicles that move to the early endosome.

(EGF Receptor Downregulation by CBL Pathway, NCI Thesaurus/BIOCARTA)

The injury usually results from arthritis or pinching by the adjacent vertebrae.

(Cervicocranial Syndrome, NCI Thesaurus)

'Thankee,' said the knight politely, as he took a pinch and sneezed seven times so violently that his head fell off.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)