kitsch

[kich]
noun
something of tawdry design, appearance, or content created to appeal to popular or undiscriminating taste.

Origin:
1925–30; < German, derivative of kitschen to throw together (a work of art)

kitsch·y, adjective
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Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2013.
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Collins
World English Dictionary
kitsch (kɪtʃ) [Click for IPA pronunciation guide]
 
n
a.  tawdry, vulgarized, or pretentious art, literature, etc, usually with popular or sentimental appeal
 b.  (as modifier): a kitsch plaster bust of Beethoven
 
[C20: from German]
 
'kitschy
 
adj

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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00:10
Kitsch is always a great word to know.
So is zedonk. Does it mean:
the offspring of a zebra and a donkey.
a gadget; dingus; thingumbob.
Etymonline
Word Origin & History

kitsch
1926, from Ger., lit. "gaudy, trash," from dial. kitschen "to smear."
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
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American Heritage
Cultural Dictionary
kitsch [(kich)]

Works of art and other objects (such as furniture) that are meant to look costly but actually are in poor taste.

Note: Kitsch in literature and music is associated with sentimentalism as well as bad taste.
The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Slang Dictionary

kitsch definition

[kɪtʃ]
  1. n.
    any form of entertainment—movies, books, plays—with enormous popular appeal. : This kitsch sells like mad in the big city.
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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Example sentences
Only if you enjoy pseudo-events and have a taste for phantasmagoric kitsch.
The lines between garish kitsch and substantive reality have been annihilated.
The lines separating carnival and culture, art and kitsch seem to have
  disappeared.
Yet academic chops and self-seriousness are also the hallmarks of kitsch.
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