ROUGH-AND-TUMBLE Definition & Meaning

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rough-and-tumble

[ ruhf-uhn-tuhm-buhl ]

Phonetic (Standard)IPA

adjective

characterized by violent, random, disorderly action and struggles:
a rough-and-tumble fight; He led an adventuresome, rough-and-tumble life.
given to such action.

noun

rough and unrestrained competition, fighting, struggling, etc.

rough-and-tumble

noun

a fight or scuffle without rules

adjective

characterized by roughness, disorderliness, and disregard for rules or conventions

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�y��vlog History and Origins

Origin of rough-and-tumble¹

First recorded in 1785–95

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Idioms and Phrases

Disorderly scuffling or infighting, as in She had some reservations about entering the rough and tumble of local politics . This expression originated in the late 1700s in boxing, where it referred to a fight without rules. [Mid-1800s]

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Example Sentences

Examples have not been reviewed.

Her swift rise through San Francisco’s rough-and-tumble politics were defined by days in courtrooms representing victims and nights at glitzy political galas.

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Harris is the biracial daughter of immigrants whose career was forged by the rough-and-tumble Democratic politics of the Bay Area — a place nationally synonymous with West Coast liberalism.

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Harris, a former prosecutor, is a product of the same rough-and-tumble Bay Area politics that produced some of the nation’s most high-profile Democrats, including Newsom, former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and former U.S.

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Politically reticent, she has spent years avoiding the rough-and-tumble of the culture wars.

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Kim, who has shown a knack for holding his own in the rough-and-tumble world of New Jersey politics, easily won the Democratic nomination in Tuesday’s primaries.

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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

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