squawk
UK/skwɔːk/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Australia/skwoːk/
squawk noun: a shrill noise, especially made by a voice or bird. If made by a bird, it typically signals discomfort or anger; a yell, scream, or call.
Noun
squawk (plural squawks)
- A shrill noise, especially made by a voice or bird. If made by a bird, it typically signals discomfort or anger; a yell, scream, or call.
- A four-digit transponder code used by aircraft for identification or transmission of emergency signals.
- A complaint or objection.
- That was the last roundup for McCutcheon’s Cresswell; it never moved from that field again. Not that there was any squawk from the landlord; the two of them owned it, of course.1983, Stephen King, Uncle Otto's Truck
- An issue or complaint related to aircraft maintenance.
- We think instructors should stress the importance of writeups on all maintenance squawks after the completion of each flight. More important, something should be done by the aircraft operator to correct such squawks.1969, American Aviation, volume 32
- The American night heron.
- A warning message indicating a possible error.
- The function-hiding code above, for instance, goes through a different (but widely used) compiler with nary a squawk.2012, Scott Meyers, Effective C++ Digital Collection: 140 Ways to Improve Your Programming
Verb
squawk (third-person singular simple present squawks, present participle squawking, simple past and past participle squawked)
- To make a squawking noise; to yell, scream, or call out shrilly.
- The hens woke up squawking with terror because they had all dreamed simultaneously of hearing a gun go off in the distance.1943 November – 1944 February (date written; published 1945 August 17), George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Animal Farm […], London: Secker & Warburg, published May 1962, →OCLC
- To speak out; to protest.
- To report an infraction; to rat on or tattle; to disclose a secret.
- "I'll slit your throat if you squawk on us," Krantz threatened.1948, Andrew Geer, The Sea Chase, page 68
- To produce a warning message, indicating a possible error.
- That way, if you type = instead of ==, the compiler will squawk because you can't assign something to a constant.1993, Steve Maguire, Writing Solid Code
- You want the compiler to squawk if you try to instantiate for a type that doesn't implement IPrioritizable.2013, Bill Sempf, Chuck Sphar, Stephen R. Davis, C# 5.0 All-in-One For Dummies
- To set or transmit a four-digit transponder code. (Normally followed by the specific code in question.)
- After discovering that the hydraulic system is faulty, the pilots squawked 7700 and declared mayday.
- To back out in a mean way.
squawk meaning in Tamil, Bengali, Malayalam and Kannada
squawk in Tamil
- கிறீச்சொலி, பறவையின் அலறல், அச்சக் கூவிளி, வேதனைக் கூக்குரல், கிறீச்சிடு, பறவை வகையில் அலறு
squawk in Bengali
- কর্কশ শব্দে চিৎকার করা
squawk in Malayalam
- squeal, screech, shriek
- കാറുക, പനട്ടുക, പെനത്തുക, കർക്കശം ആക്രോശിക്കുക, കൊക്കുക, കോഴി കൊക്കുക
- squeal, screech, shriek
- കൂജനം, പനട്ടൽ, പനറ്റൽ, കക്ക്, കനപ്പ്, കൊക്കൽ
squawk in Kannada
- ಅರಚು
More languagesFewer languages
- squawk in Arabic
- صَخَب ṣaḵab, صَخِبَ ṣaḵiba
- squawk in Vietnamese
- quác quác
Examples of squawk in a sentence
- Every morning we woke up to the squawking of what seemed like a hundred murders in the trees above our campsite.
- The house phone rang -- a sudden shrill squawk of electronic noise.
- One young chick is standing on its toes, flapping crazily, squawking a long ‘not-happy-Jan’ cry in penguin-speak.
Forms of squawk
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | squawks |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | squawks |
| present participle | squawking |
| past participle | squawked |
| past | squawked |
| second-person singular present (archaic) | squawkest |
| second-person singular past (archaic) | squawkedst |
| third-person singular present (archaic) | squawketh |
Origin of squawk
First attested in 1821. Unknown, but probably of imitative origin (compare dialectal Italian squacco (“small-crested heron”) and English quack).
Words formed from squawk
Phrases with squawk
Words that rhyme with squawk
Questions about squawk
- What does squawk mean?
- Squawk means a shrill noise, especially made by a voice or bird. If made by a bird, it typically signals discomfort or anger; a yell, scream, or call.
- What is squawk in Tamil?
- Squawk in Tamil is கிறீச்சொலி, பறவையின் அலறல், அச்சக் கூவிளி. See Squawk meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is squawk?
- Squawk can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce squawk?
- Squawk is pronounced /skwɔːk/ (UK).
- What is the plural of squawk?
- The plural of squawk is squawks.
Words near squawk in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: squawk (page history and authors); squawk (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); squawk (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); squawk (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); squawk (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-squawk.ogg.
Cite this entry: “squawk.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/squawk. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.