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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

spook.

A ghost or phantom.

5 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/spuːk//spʊk/US, dialectal

  1. A ghost or phantom.

    informal
    The building was haunted by a couple of spooks.

  2. A scare or fright.

    informal
    The big spider gave me a spook.

  3. An undercover agent, spy, or intelligence analyst.

    slang

  4. A black person.

    dated · ethnic · offensive · slang · slur

  5. A metaphysical manifestation; an artificial distinction or construct.

  6. A psychiatrist.

    US · slang

  7. A player who engages in hole carding by attempting to glimpse the dealer's hole card when the dealer checks under an ace or a 10 to see if a blackjack is present.

    slang
Where this word comes from

Borrowed from Dutch spook (“ghost”), from Middle Dutch spooc (“spook, ghost”). Cognate with Middle Low German spôk, spûk (“apparition, ghost”), Middle High German gespük (“a haunting”), German Spuk, Danish spøge (“to haunt”), Swedish spöke (“ghost”).

verb/spuːk//spʊk/US, dialectal

  1. To frighten or make nervous (especially by startling).

    transitive
    The hunters were spooked when the black cat crossed their path. The movement in the bushes spooked the deer and they ran.

  2. To become frightened (by something startling).

    intransitive
    The deer spooked at the sound of the dogs.

  3. To haunt.

    transitive
Where this word comes from

Borrowed from Dutch spook (“ghost”), from Middle Dutch spooc (“spook, ghost”). Cognate with Middle Low German spôk, spûk (“apparition, ghost”), Middle High German gespük (“a haunting”), German Spuk, Danish spøge (“to haunt”), Swedish spöke (“ghost”).

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.