blowback

Questions about blowback

What does blowback mean?

blowback means "the backward escape of gases and unburned gunpowder after a gun is fired". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in blowback?

blowback has 2 syllables and divides as blow-back under the regular spelling rules. It is not in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, so that comes from how the word is written rather than from a recorded pronunciation, and no stress or phonetic transcription is claimed for it.

What is another word for blowback?

Close synonyms include backfire. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is blowback a common word?

blowback is banded "Uncommon" — turns up in careful writing rather than conversation. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.