Word.ws English Dictionary

backscratcher

backscratcher noun: a long slender rod with a rake-like device on one end, sometimes in the form of a human hand, designed to let a person scratch their own back.

Noun

backscratcher (plural backscratchers)

  1. A long slender rod with a rake-like device on one end, sometimes in the form of a human hand, designed to let a person scratch their own back.
  2. (figuratively, uncommon) A participant in corruption, such as a briber or pay-to-play participant.
    • Pierre-Gilles had made a name for himself, but also wanted to give credit to his collaborators, whom he was always careful to cite in lectures, to the point that, for a joke, Daniel Saint-James and his colleague Gobalakichena Sarma created a "backscratchers club" named the 'Société de la brosse à...2011, Laurence Plévert, “Team Leader”, in Pierre-Gilles de Gennes: A Life in Science, World Scientific, →ISBN, pages 119-120

backscratcher meaning in Tagalog and Thai

backscratcher in Tagalog

rod for scratching one's own back
pangamot ng likod

backscratcher in Thai

rod for scratching one's own back
ไม้เกาหลัง máai-gao-lǎng

Forms of backscratcher

pluralbackscratchers
alternative formback scratcher

Origin of backscratcher

From back + scratcher; also, by surface analysis, backscratch + -er.

Questions about backscratcher

What does backscratcher mean?
Backscratcher means a long slender rod with a rake-like device on one end, sometimes in the form of a human hand, designed to let a person scratch their own back.
What is backscratcher in Tagalog?
Backscratcher in Tagalog is pangamot ng likod. See Backscratcher meaning in Tagalog.
What part of speech is backscratcher?
Backscratcher is a noun.
What is the plural of backscratcher?
The plural of backscratcher is backscratchers.

Words near backscratcher in the dictionary

  1. backscattersondes
  2. backscene
  3. backscenes
  4. backscratch
  5. backscratched
  6. backscratcher
  7. backscratchers
  8. backscratches
  9. backscratching
  10. backscratchings
  11. backscreen

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: backscratcher (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-backscratcher.wav.

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