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sabotage - 6 dictionary results

sab⋅o⋅tage

  [sab-uh-tahzh, sab-uh-tahzh] noun, verb, -taged, -tag⋅ing.
Use sabotage in a Sentence
–noun
1. any underhand interference with production, work, etc., in a plant, factory, etc., as by enemy agents during wartime or by employees during a trade dispute.
2. any undermining of a cause.
–verb (used with object)
3. to injure or attack by sabotage.
Origin:
1865–70; < F, equiv. to sabot(er) to botch, orig., to strike, shake up, harry, deriv. of sabot sabot + -age -age

Synonyms:
3. disable, vandalize, cripple.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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sab·o·tage   (sāb'ə-täzh')   
n.  
  1. Destruction of property or obstruction of normal operations, as by civilians or enemy agents in time of war.
  2. Treacherous action to defeat or hinder a cause or an endeavor; deliberate subversion.
tr.v.   sab·o·taged, sab·o·tag·ing, sab·o·tag·es
To commit sabotage against.

[French, from saboter, to walk noisily, bungle, sabotage, from sabot, sabot; see sabot.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Sabotage

Sa`bo`tage"\, n. [F.] (a) Scamped work. (b) Malicious waste or destruction of an employer's property or injury to his interests by workmen during labor troubles.
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.
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Language Translation for : sabotage
Spanish: sabotaje,
German: die Sabotage,
Japanese: 破壊行為
More Translations »

sabotage  (n.)
1910, from Fr. sabotage, from saboter "to sabotage, bungle," lit. "walk noisily," from sabot "wooden shoe" (13c.), altered (by association with O.Fr. bot "boot") from M.Fr. savate "old shoe," from an unidentified source that also produced similar words in O.Prov., Port., Sp., It., Arabic and Basque. In Fr., the sense of "deliberately and maliciously destroying property" originally was in ref. to labor disputes, but the oft-repeated story that the modern meaning derives from strikers' supposed tactic of throwing old shoes into machinery is not supported by the etymology. Likely it was not meant as a literal image; the word was used in Fr. in a variety of "bungling" senses, such as "to play a piece of music badly." The verb is first attested 1918 in Eng., from the noun. Saboteur is 1921, a borrowing from Fr.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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Main Entry: sab·o·tage
Pronunciation: 'sa-b&-"täzh
Function: noun
Etymology: French, from saboter to clatter with wooden shoes, botch, sabotage, from sabot wooden shoe
1 : the willful destruction of an employer's property or the hindering of normal operations by other means
2 : the injury, destruction, or knowingly defective production of materials, premises, or utilities used for war or national defense —compare CRIMINAL SYNDICALISM, SEDITION
Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law, © 1996 Merriam-Webster, Inc.
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sabotage

deliberate destruction of property or slowing down of work with the intention of damaging a business or economic system or weakening a government or nation in a time of national emergency. The word is said to date from a French railway strike of 1910 when workers destroyed the wooden shoes (sabots) that held the rails in place. A few years later sabotage was employed in the United States in the form of slowdowns, particularly in situations that made a strike untenable-such as by migratory workers whose employment was temporary. During World War II anti-German resistance and partisan movements in Europe practiced effective sabotage against factories, military installations, railroads, bridges, and so on, especially in the Soviet Union. After the war, sabotage became the basic weapon of the numerous insurgent groups associated with anticolonial, separatist, and communist-backed movements

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Encyclopedia Britannica, 2008. Encyclopedia Britannica Online.
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