Nearby Words

doodad

[doo-dad] Origin

doo·dad

[doo-dad]
noun Informal.
1.
a decorative embellishment; trinket; bauble: a dress covered with doodads.
2.
a gadget; device: a kitchen full of the latest doodads.
Also, do-dad.


Origin:
1900–05; gradational compound based on dial. dad piece, flake
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Doodad is always a great word to know.
So is doohickey. Does it mean:
a gadget; dingus; thingumbob.
a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces, designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after a rhetorical question.
Collins
World English Dictionary
doodah or (US and Canadian) doodad (ˈduːdɑː, ˈduːdæd)
 
n
1.  an unnamed thing, esp an object the name of which is unknown or forgotten
2.  all of a doodah excited; agitated
 
[C20: of uncertain origin]
 
doodad or (US and Canadian) doodad
 
n
 
[C20: of uncertain origin]

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline
Word Origin & History

doodad
"unnamed thing," 1905, chiefly U.S., a made-up word; as is doohickey (1914).
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
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Slang Dictionary

doodad definition

[ˈdudæd]
  1. n.
    a name for a gadget. : I don't know what they're called. If they had names, they wouldn't be doodads, now would they?
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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