lightweight n.
1. (orig. US, also featherweight) an insignificant person, a weakling.
![]() | in Annals of the War 508: They were both ‘light weights’ in their profession [HDAS]. | |
![]() | Girton Girl 205: I am not good at these high passions! [...] In everything I am a light weight . | |
![]() | True Bills 29: He celebrated the Glad New-Year by standing around in Doorways and looking mournfully at the Light-Weights who were doing the Cotillon. | ‘The Fable of Successful Tobias’ in|
![]() | Ragged Trousered Philanthropists (1955) 233: You may be sure it won’t be Sawkins or any of the other lightweights. | |
![]() | (con. 1925) Mint (1955) 193: Our light-weights will go wicked and take their revenge out of the innocent work. | |
![]() | Public Enemy [film script] Couple of lightweights . . . yeah, flat tyres. | |
![]() | Runyon à la Carte 165: Of course Johnny is a lightweight [...] everybody knows he is a complete nitwit. | |
![]() | CUSS 151: Lightweight An effeminate male. | et al.|
![]() | ‘Sl. of Watts’ in Current Sl. III:2 33: Lightweight, n. A person with low intelligence. | |
![]() | Carlito’s Way 95: In walked Walberto and Monchin. [...] Never seen one without the other—two lightweights, but Monchin was sneaky fast and would hurt you. | |
![]() | In La-La Land We Trust (1999) 36: Who the hell did you think you were out with? Some asshole featherweight? | |
![]() | Bonfire of the Vanities 61: And therefore . . . no slackers allowed! no deadwood! no lightweights! | |
![]() | Filth 186: What about the case? I say coldly and briskly, making Toal and Drummond look like the frivolous lightweights they are. | |
![]() | Indep. 14 Feb. 18: Get on with it Flo, you lightweight! | |
![]() | Viva La Madness 21: People [...] thought he was a lightweight, the court jester. | |
![]() | August Snow [ebook] ‘Mind if I don’t shake your hand?’ I said. ‘Lightweight’. |
2. an intellectual mediocrity.
![]() | Ade’s Fables 53: He saw many a Light Weight with [...] just enough intellectual Acumen to stir Tea with out spilling it. | ‘The New Fable of the Intermittent Fusser’ in|
![]() | Tales (1969) 13: You better start thinking about him [i.e. a professor] or you’ll punch right out. They don’t need lightweights down in the valley. |
3. (US black) one who leads a sheltered life and does not properly participate in the tougher ghetto world.
![]() | Carlito’s Way 46: Check out them lightweights good before you bury them. |
4. one who cannot equal their peers in the sphere of drinking or taking drugs.
![]() | Blueschild Baby 22: ‘What you been doing since you got out? Fucking around again?’ ‘Yeah, light weight though, ain’t got no jones yet’. | |
![]() | Campus Sl. Oct. | |
![]() | Sl. U. 122: Tony drank one beer and was totally blitzed — what a lightweight. | |
![]() | College Sl. Research Project (Cal. State Poly. Uni., Pomona) 🌐 Lightweight (noun) Someone who can’t hold their alcohol. | |
![]() | Peepshow [ebook] A half [i.e. tablet of MDMA] was for lightweights, which he most certainly was not. | |
![]() | (con. 1980s) Skagboys 275: C’moan, Tam, ya fuckin lightweight, he roars at Tommy, whae returns fae the bog lookin like a ghost. | |
![]() | ‘Tommy, Who Loved to Laugh’ in ThugLit Sept. [ebook] [O]ccasionally [...] sharing the whiskey. I was a lightweight at this point and there was plenty to go around. | |
![]() | Cobble Hill 166: Tupper was a lightweight and would soon be very drunk. |