hoodoo
UK/ˈhuːduː//ˈhudu/
hoodoo noun: a set of spiritual practices and traditions created and concealed from slave-owners by enslaved Africans in North America, based on traditional African beliefs.
Noun
hoodoo (countable and uncountable, plural hoodoos)
- A set of spiritual practices and traditions created and concealed from slave-owners by enslaved Africans in North America, based on traditional African beliefs.
- A practitioner of voodoo.
- Supernatural bad luck, or something or someone believed to bring bad luck.
- The three men wondered whether they would find Colson at Taylor's Creek. They felt that a hoodoo hung over the place.1931, Ion L. Idriess, Lasseter's Last Ride, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 60
- A tall thin spire of rock that protrudes from the bottom of arid basins and badlands.
- It was even larger than the mirage made it look—a dozen miles across and a thousand feet deep, with fins and towers and hoodoos like observation posts, mesas and minor buttes, springs flowing brightly in the red rock.2013, Philipp Meyer, The Son, Simon & Schuster, published 2014, page 71
- This park’s strange and beautiful rock formations were formed by the Yellowstone River and various streams that have cut through the rock over millions of years, carving out hoodoos, spires and caprocks. The name Makoshika comes from a Lakota word for badlands.2018 July 17, Autumn Spanne, “Check out these crazy rock formations across the United States”, in CNN
- Synonyms:
- tent rock, fairy chimney, earth pyramid
Verb
hoodoo (third-person singular simple present hoodoos, present participle hoodooing, simple past and past participle hoodooed)
- To jinx; to bring bad luck or misfortune to.
hoodoo meaning in Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada
hoodoo in Tamil
- போகூழ், கெட்ட பெயர்
hoodoo in Malayalam
- black magic, witchcraft, magic
- ആഭിചാരം, മന്ത്രവാദം, ക്ഷുദ്രം, ദുർമന്ത്രവാദം, മൂലകർമ്മം, വിദ്യ
hoodoo in Kannada
- ದುರಷ್ಟ, ದುರ್ದೈವ, ದುರ್ವಿಧಿ, ದುರಷ್ಟಕಾರಿ, ವಿಚಿತ್ರ ಶಿಲಾಸ್ತಂಭ
Synonyms of hoodoo
Forms of hoodoo
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | hoodoos |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | hoodoos |
| present participle | hoodooing |
| past participle | hoodooed |
| past | hoodooed |
Origin of hoodoo
Apparently an alteration of voodoo.
Words formed from hoodoo
Words that rhyme with hoodoo
Questions about hoodoo
- What does hoodoo mean?
- Hoodoo means a set of spiritual practices and traditions created and concealed from slave-owners by enslaved Africans in North America, based on traditional African beliefs.
- What is hoodoo in Tamil?
- Hoodoo in Tamil is போகூழ், கெட்ட பெயர். See Hoodoo meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is hoodoo?
- Hoodoo can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce hoodoo?
- Hoodoo is pronounced /ˈhuːduː/ (UK).
- What is the plural of hoodoo?
- The plural of hoodoo is hoodoos.
Words near hoodoo in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: hoodoo (page history and authors); hoodoo (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); hoodoo (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); hoodoo (Kannada Wiktionary) (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-us-hoodoo.oga.
Cite this entry: “hoodoo.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/hoodoo. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.