Word.ws English Dictionary

Chinaman on one's back

Chinaman on one's back noun: a drug addiction.

Noun

Chinaman on one's back (plural Chinamen on their backs)

  1. (offensive, slang) A drug addiction.
    • The chances are that he will stay with his first love, the needle, and that the habit will lose the glorious drive and tingle that it had at first, and become the chinaman on his back who drives him like a slave to get more money to buy more junk.2003, David W. Maurer, Whiz Mob: A Correlation of the Technical Argot of Pickpockets with Their Behavior Pattern, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, →ISBN, page 163
  2. (offensive, slang) Withdrawal symptoms.

Synonyms of Chinaman on one's back

Forms of Chinaman on one's back

pluralChinamen on their backs

Origin of Chinaman on one's back

The use of "Chinaman" could possibly refer to the use of opium becoming a historical stereotype of Chinese people.

Questions about Chinaman on one's back

What does Chinaman on one's back mean?
Chinaman on one's back means a drug addiction.
What part of speech is Chinaman on one's back?
Chinaman on one's back is a noun.
What is the plural of Chinaman on one's back?
The plural of Chinaman on one's back is Chinamen on their backs.

Words near Chinaman on one's back in the dictionary

  1. Chinahat
  2. chinaldine
  3. chinaldines
  4. chinalike
  5. chinaman
  6. Chinaman on one's back
  7. Chinaman's chance
  8. Chinaman's chance in hell
  9. Chinaman's Peak
  10. Chinamanfish
  11. Chinamania

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Chinaman on one's back (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-Chinaman on one's back.ogg.

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