flak

• flack (adverse criticism and spokesperson senses)

Borrowed from German FlaK, short for Fliegerabwehrkanone (“anti aeroplane cannon”).

• IPA^(key): /flæk/
• Rhymes: -æk
• Homophone: flack

flak (countable and uncountable, plural flaks)

1. Ground-based anti-aircraft guns firing explosive shells. [from 1938]

   Synonyms: ack-ack, AAA, triple-A

   • 1964, David John Cawdell Irving, The Destruction of Dresden, page 74,

     […] to consider whether the city was in February 1945 an undefended city within the meaning of the 1907 Hague Convention, it will be necessary to examine the establishment and subsequent total dispersal of the city's flak batteries, before the date of the triple blow.

   • 2007, Samuel W. Mitcham, Jr., Retreat to the Reich: The German Defeat in France, 1944, footnote, page 30,

     He was promoted to general of flak artillery on March 1, 1945, and ended the war as the general of the flak arm at OKL, the High Command of the Luftwaffe.

2. Anti-aircraft shell fire. [from 1940]

   Synonym: ack-ack

   • 1943 November 29, Target: Germany, in Life, page 80,

     At 1057 we were just over the islands and at 1100 the tail gunner reported flak at six o'clock, below.

   • 1984, Steve Harris, "Aces High", Iron Maiden, Powerslave.

     There goes the siren that warns of the air raid / Then comes the sound of the guns sending flak / Out for the scramble we've got to get airborne / Got to get up for the coming attack.

   • 1999, Brian O'Neill, Half a Wing, Three Engines and a Prayer, page 118,

     I could hear the fragments from the flak shells hitting the plane like someone throwing rocks at it.

3. (figuratively, informal) Adverse criticism. [from 1963]
   • 2011 December 10, Marc Higginson, “Bolton 1 - 2 Aston Villa”, in BBC Sport‎:

     Alex McLeish, perhaps mindful of the flak he has been taking from sections of the Villa support for a perceived negative style of play, handed starts to wingers Charles N'Zogbia and Albrighton.

   • 1990, Joel H. Spring, The American School, 1642-1990, page 380,

     This filter Herman and Chomsky call “flak,” which refers to letters, speeches, phone calls, and other forms of group and individual complaints. Advertisers and broadcasters avoid programming content that might cause large volumes of flak.

4. (informal) A public-relations spokesperson.
   • 2006, Edward Herman, Noam Chomsky, A Propaganda Model, in 2006 [2001], Meenakshi Gigi Durham, Douglas Kellner (editors), Media and Cultural Studies: Keyworks, revised edition, page 277,

     AIM head, Reed Irvine's diatribes are frequently published, and right-wing network flaks who regularly assail the “liberal media,” such as Michael Ledeen, are given Op-ed column space, sympathetic reviews, and a regular place on talk shows as experts.

• flak jacket

• KLFA, falk

From Proto-Albanian *awa-laka, from Proto-Indo-European *lek- (“to jump, scuttle”) (compare Norwegian dialect lakka ‘to hop, patter about’, Latvian lèkt (“to spring, jump”), Ancient Greek ληκάω (lēkáō, “to dance to music”).[1]

flak (first-person singular past tense flaka, participle flakur)

1. to throw, hurl, toss, fling off
2. to smack
3. (figuratively) to cast off, eject
4. (figuratively) to renounce, reject

• fletë

• IPA^(key): /flaːk/
• Rhymes: -aːk

flak n (genitive singular flaks, nominative plural flök)

1. wreck
2. filet, (UK) fillet (of fish)

• (wreck): rekald n
• (a fish fillet): flak af fiski n

• flaka

• lundir (of beef etc.)

From Old Norse flaga, flak

flak n (definite singular flaket, indefinite plural flak, definite plural flaka or flakene)

1. a flake
2. floe (of ice)
3. tail (of a garment; coat tail, shirt tail)

• isflak

• “flak” in The Bokmål Dictionary.
• “flak_3” in Det Norske Akademis ordbok (NAOB).
• “flak_2” in Det Norske Akademis ordbok (NAOB).

From Old Norse flaga, flak. Akin to English flake.

• IPA^(key): /flɑːk/

flak n (definite singular flaket, indefinite plural flak, definite plural flaka)

1. a flake
2. floe (of ice)
3. tail (of a garment; coat tail, shirt tail)

• isflak
• snøflak

• “flak” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

From German Fleck.

• IPA^(key): /flak/

• audio

  (file)

flak m inan

1. sausage casing made from animal intestine
2. (informal) flat tire
3. (colloquial) innard, entrail

• flaki

• flak in Polish dictionaries at PWN

flak n

1. a flat object, a floe, a flatbed
2. a bed, the (open) cargo area of a vehicle (e.g. truck, lorry, pickup truck, dump truck, tip truck)

• flakbil
• flakcykel
• flakmoped
• isflak
• lastbilsflak
• tippflak