pokie

English

Pronunciation
  • (Received Pronunciation) enPR: pō'kē, IPA(key): /ˈpəʊki/
  • Audio (AU)(file)
  • Homophone: pokey

Etymology 1

From poker machine +‎ -ie (“diminutive suffix”); believed to have been coined in New South Wales in the 1970s.

Noun

pokie (plural pokies)

  1. (Australia, New Zealand, slang) A poker machine.
    • 2004, Bernard Salt, The Big Shift, page 77,
      For several decades until the early 1990s, Echuca–Moama existed in the consciousness of Melburnians as the destination for pokie bus-trips. All of this changed when the Kennett Government legalised pokies in Victoria in 1993.
    • 2006, author not known, Sydney City Guide, Lonely Planet, page 148,
      In reality, the cheap beer and walls of pokies attract anyone and everyone.
    • 2008, Catherine Deveny, Say When, page 171,
      None of these people around me punching the pokies has walked in here today expecting to be a loser.
Synonyms

See also

Etymology 2

Shortening of genus name Poecilotheria

Noun

pokie (plural pokies)

  1. (informal) Any of several species of arboreal tarantula in the genus Poecilotheria.

Further reading
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