spanking

Other forms of spanking

plural

spankings·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about spanking

What does spanking mean?

spanking means "the act of slapping on the buttocks". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in spanking?

spanking has 2 syllables: span-king. The stress falls on "span". In IPA it is /ˈspæŋkɪŋ/.

What is another word for spanking?

Close synonyms include alert, brisk, lively, merry, rattling. 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 spanking a common word?

spanking is banded "Familiar" — widely understood, used when the subject calls for it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.