"Silent Sam" meaning in English

See Silent Sam in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

IPA: /ˌsaɪlənt ˈsæm/ Audio: en-au-Silent Sam.ogg [Australia] Forms: Silent Sams [plural]
Etymology: From silent (“speechless, mute”) + Sam (“diminutive of male given name Samuel”). From ante 1920. Etymology templates: {{m|en|silent||speechless, mute}} silent (“speechless, mute”), {{m|en|Sam||diminutive of male given name Samuel}} Sam (“diminutive of male given name Samuel”) Head templates: {{en-noun|head=Silent Sam}} Silent Sam (plural Silent Sams)
  1. (informal, sometimes used attributively) A person who seldom or never speaks; a taciturn or unresponsive individual. Tags: attributive, informal, sometimes Categories (topical): People Translations (person who speaks seldom and little): tuppisuu (Finnish), milczek [masculine] (Polish)
    Sense id: en-Silent_Sam-en-noun-xN38rNGD Disambiguation of People: 47 0 53 Disambiguation of 'person who speaks seldom and little': 95 2 4
  2. (informal, by extension) A machine, device, etc. which operates without making noticeable sound. Tags: broadly, informal
    Sense id: en-Silent_Sam-en-noun-UUxcbCb-
  3. (informal) A mixed alcoholic beverage, usually containing vodka, a cola soft drink, and other ingredients. Tags: informal Categories (topical): Alcoholic beverages, People, Personality Synonyms: silent Sam
    Sense id: en-Silent_Sam-en-noun-FD~3Wv3n Disambiguation of Alcoholic beverages: 5 4 91 Disambiguation of People: 47 0 53 Disambiguation of Personality: 26 7 67 Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English entries with topic categories using raw markup, English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 30 24 46 Disambiguation of English entries with topic categories using raw markup: 35 14 51 Disambiguation of English terms with non-redundant non-automated sortkeys: 27 18 55 Related terms: Alibi Ike, Dapper Dan, dismal Dora, doubting Thomas, dreamy Daniel, fancy Dan, Gentleman Jim, gloomy Gus, good-time Charlie, lazy Lawrence, nervous Nellie, nervous Purvis, plain Jane, sneaky Pete

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for Silent Sam meaning in English (6.6kB)

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        "2": "silent",
        "3": "",
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  "etymology_text": "From silent (“speechless, mute”) + Sam (“diminutive of male given name Samuel”). From ante 1920.",
  "forms": [
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  "head_templates": [
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
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          "ref": "1983 Mar, “Sam Pierce Hangs Tough”, in Black Enterprise, volume 13, number 8, page 43",
          "text": "But because Pierce has usually avoided the news media and gone about his work in the quiet behind-the-scenes way that brought him eminence as a top New York City litigator, the press has derisively tagged him \"Silent Sam.\"",
          "type": "quotation"
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          "ref": "2002, Jack Womack, Going, Going, Gone, page 47",
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        {
          "ref": "2011, Linda Carter Sobell, Mark B. Sobell, Group Therapy for Substance Use Disorders, page 205",
          "text": "With Silent Sam clients it is important for group leaders to make active and continuous efforts to get them involved in the group.",
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      ],
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          "_dis1": "95 2 4",
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          "word": "tuppisuu"
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          "type": "quotation"
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        {
          "ref": "1977 July, Richard West, “Reporter: Law and Order”, in Texas Monthly, volume 5, number 7, page 64",
          "text": "Or if you're a coward, there's Silent Sam ($1950), an automated early-warning safety robot flagman.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
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        "(informal, by extension) A machine, device, etc. which operates without making noticeable sound."
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          "type": "quotation"
        }
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        "(informal) A mixed alcoholic beverage, usually containing vodka, a cola soft drink, and other ingredients."
      ],
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        {
          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
          "word": "Alibi Ike"
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          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
          "word": "Dapper Dan"
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          "word": "dismal Dora"
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          "word": "doubting Thomas"
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          "word": "dreamy Daniel"
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          "word": "Gentleman Jim"
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          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
          "word": "gloomy Gus"
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          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
          "word": "good-time Charlie"
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        {
          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
          "word": "lazy Lawrence"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
          "word": "nervous Nellie"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
          "word": "nervous Purvis"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
          "word": "plain Jane"
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        {
          "_dis1": "18 13 69",
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      "synonyms": [
        {
          "_dis1": "33 24 42",
          "word": "silent Sam"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
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    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˌsaɪlənt ˈsæm/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "en-au-Silent Sam.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/9/9a/En-au-Silent_Sam.ogg/En-au-Silent_Sam.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9a/En-au-Silent_Sam.ogg",
      "tags": [
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      ],
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  ],
  "word": "Silent Sam"
}
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  "etymology_text": "From silent (“speechless, mute”) + Sam (“diminutive of male given name Samuel”). From ante 1920.",
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          "text": "But because Pierce has usually avoided the news media and gone about his work in the quiet behind-the-scenes way that brought him eminence as a top New York City litigator, the press has derisively tagged him \"Silent Sam.\"",
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          "text": "Now he threw the Silent Sam treatment on me.",
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        },
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          "text": "It's hard to get input from the Silent Sam even with a direct question—this person just doesn't have anything to say.",
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        },
        {
          "ref": "2011, Linda Carter Sobell, Mark B. Sobell, Group Therapy for Substance Use Disorders, page 205",
          "text": "With Silent Sam clients it is important for group leaders to make active and continuous efforts to get them involved in the group.",
          "type": "quotation"
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        "(informal, sometimes used attributively) A person who seldom or never speaks; a taciturn or unresponsive individual."
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          "ref": "1919, Victor Appleton, chapter 17, in Tom Swift and His Air Scout",
          "text": "\"I've named my new noiseless aeroplane—Army Air Scout—I've named that Silent Sam. Wait until you hear it, or rather, don't hear it, and I think you'll agree with me. Silent Sam for Uncle Sam!\"",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1977 July, Richard West, “Reporter: Law and Order”, in Texas Monthly, volume 5, number 7, page 64",
          "text": "Or if you're a coward, there's Silent Sam ($1950), an automated early-warning safety robot flagman.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
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      ],
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        "(informal) A mixed alcoholic beverage, usually containing vodka, a cola soft drink, and other ingredients."
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      "ipa": "/ˌsaɪlənt ˈsæm/"
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  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "silent Sam"
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  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "person who speaks seldom and little",
      "word": "tuppisuu"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
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      "sense": "person who speaks seldom and little",
      "tags": [
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      "word": "milczek"
    }
  ],
  "word": "Silent Sam"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-01 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-04-21 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.