See idiot box in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
Download JSON data for idiot box meaning in English (3.5kB)
{
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "idiot",
"3": "box"
},
"expansion": "idiot + box",
"name": "compound"
}
],
"etymology_text": "From idiot + box, an allusion to the supposed mind-reducing nature of television programming or its lack of educational value.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "idiot boxes",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "idiot box (plural idiot boxes)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "American English",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "Canadian English",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w"
}
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "2003 March 31, Bill Litchfield, “Basketball Fans”, in rec.gardens (Usenet)",
"text": "During the long, dreary, wet winter I amused myself by watching college and Pro basketball on the idiot box.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Television."
],
"id": "en-idiot_box-en-noun-M7ekgZDL",
"links": [
[
"Television",
"television"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(idiomatic, chiefly US and Canada) Television."
],
"synonyms": [
{
"alt": "boob = idiot",
"topics": [
"television",
"broadcasting",
"media"
],
"word": "boob tube"
}
],
"tags": [
"Canada",
"US",
"idiomatic"
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "treurbuis"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"word": "telkkari"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"word": "töllö"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"colloquial",
"feminine"
],
"word": "Glotze"
},
{
"code": "el",
"lang": "Greek",
"roman": "chazokoúti",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"neuter"
],
"word": "χαζοκούτι"
},
{
"code": "is",
"lang": "Icelandic",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "imbakassi"
},
{
"alt": "contamination of \"деби́л\"(retard) and \"телеви́зор\" (TV set)",
"code": "ru",
"lang": "Russian",
"roman": "debilízor",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "дебили́зор"
},
{
"code": "ru",
"lang": "Russian",
"roman": "zombojáščik",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "зомбоя́щик"
},
{
"code": "ru",
"lang": "Russian",
"roman": "duroskóp",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "дуроско́п"
},
{
"code": "ru",
"lang": "Russian",
"roman": "zombovízor",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "зомбови́зор"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "caja boba"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "caja idiota"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "caja tonta"
},
{
"code": "sv",
"lang": "Swedish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"common-gender"
],
"word": "dumburk"
}
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-idiot box.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/8/8d/En-au-idiot_box.ogg/En-au-idiot_box.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8d/En-au-idiot_box.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"word": "idiot box"
}
{
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"2": "idiot",
"3": "box"
},
"expansion": "idiot + box",
"name": "compound"
}
],
"etymology_text": "From idiot + box, an allusion to the supposed mind-reducing nature of television programming or its lack of educational value.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "idiot boxes",
"tags": [
"plural"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "idiot box (plural idiot boxes)",
"name": "en-noun"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "noun",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"American English",
"Canadian English",
"English compound terms",
"English countable nouns",
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English idioms",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English nouns",
"English terms with audio links",
"English terms with quotations"
],
"examples": [
{
"ref": "2003 March 31, Bill Litchfield, “Basketball Fans”, in rec.gardens (Usenet)",
"text": "During the long, dreary, wet winter I amused myself by watching college and Pro basketball on the idiot box.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Television."
],
"links": [
[
"Television",
"television"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(idiomatic, chiefly US and Canada) Television."
],
"tags": [
"Canada",
"US",
"idiomatic"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-idiot box.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/8/8d/En-au-idiot_box.ogg/En-au-idiot_box.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8d/En-au-idiot_box.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"alt": "boob = idiot",
"topics": [
"television",
"broadcasting",
"media"
],
"word": "boob tube"
}
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "treurbuis"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"word": "telkkari"
},
{
"code": "fi",
"lang": "Finnish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"word": "töllö"
},
{
"code": "de",
"lang": "German",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"colloquial",
"feminine"
],
"word": "Glotze"
},
{
"code": "el",
"lang": "Greek",
"roman": "chazokoúti",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"neuter"
],
"word": "χαζοκούτι"
},
{
"code": "is",
"lang": "Icelandic",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "imbakassi"
},
{
"alt": "contamination of \"деби́л\"(retard) and \"телеви́зор\" (TV set)",
"code": "ru",
"lang": "Russian",
"roman": "debilízor",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "дебили́зор"
},
{
"code": "ru",
"lang": "Russian",
"roman": "zombojáščik",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "зомбоя́щик"
},
{
"code": "ru",
"lang": "Russian",
"roman": "duroskóp",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "дуроско́п"
},
{
"code": "ru",
"lang": "Russian",
"roman": "zombovízor",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "зомбови́зор"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "caja boba"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "caja idiota"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "caja tonta"
},
{
"code": "sv",
"lang": "Swedish",
"sense": "television (pejorative)",
"tags": [
"common-gender"
],
"word": "dumburk"
}
],
"word": "idiot box"
}
{
"called_from": "form_descriptions/2013",
"msg": "more than one value in \"roman\": zombiebox vs. zombojáščik",
"path": [
"idiot box"
],
"section": "English",
"subsection": "noun",
"title": "idiot box",
"trace": ""
}
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.