chipmunk

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a small striped ground squirrel with cheek pouches, native chiefly to North America

   A chipmunk darted beneath the porch with seeds packed in its cheeks.

2. 2
   verb

   informal: to speed up recorded audio so that voices become unusually high-pitched

   The editor chipmunked the vocal track for comic effect.

Simplified etymology

Chipmunk entered English in the mid-19th century from Ojibwa jidmoonh.

An early nineteenth-century alteration of chitmunk, borrowed from an Ojibwe word for the animal, related to a description of its headfirst movement. The audio verb alludes to the high-pitched fictional voices of Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary