Word.ws English Dictionary

on the bum

on the bum prepositional phrase: living as a vagrant; homeless.

Prepositional phrase

  1. (US, slang) Living as a vagrant; homeless.
    • I ask, how many of these hobos, who are on the bum, have the courage to ask for the drink?1870, M.P. Murphy, Iron Molders' Journal, volume 32, Iron Molders' Union of North America, page 518
    • Even now, though it was December, a few poor draggled old wrecks were settling down on the benches, tucking themselves up in sort of parcels of newspaper. Gordon looked at them callously. On the bum, they called it.1936, George Orwell, Keep the Aspidistra Flying
  2. (US, obsolete) On a drinking spree.
  3. (US, slang) Not working; out of order.
    • My typewriter's on the bum—and I'm just lost. One gets so used to one that you're very dependent.1927, Hart Crane, letter, 28 March
  4. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see on, the, bum.

Questions about on the bum

What does on the bum mean?
On the bum means living as a vagrant; homeless.
What part of speech is on the bum?
On the bum is a prepositional phrase.

Words near on the bum in the dictionary

  1. on the breadline
  2. on the brew
  3. on the brink
  4. on the brink of
  5. on the bubble
  6. on the bum
  7. on the bung
  8. on the burst
  9. on the button
  10. on the cadge
  11. on the canvas

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: on the bum (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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Cite this entry: “on the bum.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/on_the_bum. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.