chigger
/ˈt͡ʃɪɡɚ/
chigger noun: a chigoe (Tunga penetrans), a kind of flea found in tropical climates.
Noun (1)
chigger (plural chiggers)
- A chigoe (Tunga penetrans), a kind of flea found in tropical climates.
- A harvest mite (Trombiculidae spp.), a very small, red mite endemic to the Midwestern and Southeastern US, the infestation of which causes intense itching.
- After we had been out about four days the entire army was attacked by ‘chiggers’. They are tiny insects, millions of them, who have made their home on the Kansas prairie.1933, Frank Clune, Try Anything Once, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 68
- Dr. Lareau, an emergency medicine physician at Carilion Franklin Memorial Hospital in Virginia, had seen these marks once or twice before on patients. She knew what had caused them. They were from chiggers, a species of tiny, reddish-brown mites able to leave bites that remain itchy for days or...2024 July 25, Carly Stern, “It’s Chigger Season. Here’s What to Know About the Pests.”, in The New York Times, →ISSN
- Synonyms:
- harvest mite
Noun (2)
chigger (plural chiggers)
- An East Asian person who behaves in ways similar to a stereotypical urban African American.
- —He's not black, Stacia Jacobs who smelled like pee said. — He's yellow and black. He's a chigger. Do you know what a chigger is? It's a chink and a nigger.2007, James Boice, MVP: A Novel, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 37
Synonyms of chigger
Forms of chigger
| plural | chiggers |
|---|---|
| alternative form | chigga |
Origin of chigger
From chigoe, likely from a Cariban language term such as Kari'na siko (“chigoe”) (early recorded variant chico), from Proto-Cariban *tikô.
Blend of chink + nigger.
Words formed from chigger
Words that rhyme with chigger
Questions about chigger
- What does chigger mean?
- Chigger means a chigoe (Tunga penetrans), a kind of flea found in tropical climates.
- What part of speech is chigger?
- Chigger is a noun.
- How do you pronounce chigger?
- Chigger is pronounced /ˈt͡ʃɪɡɚ/.
- What is the plural of chigger?
- The plural of chigger is chiggers.
Words near chigger in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: chigger (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.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-chigger.ogg.
Cite this entry: “chigger.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/chigger. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.