Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Unsteady; light; giddy; frolicsome; foolish; silly.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Scotland, Northern England Senseless; silly, foolish.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Scots glaikit.

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Examples

  • Bill had been sitting there, a glaikit look on his face.

    A Small Death in the Great Glen A. D. Scott 2010

  • Said hi also to a few of the guys from Aereogramme after they'd finished up, but wasn't actually sure of who was there from Chemikal Underground or what they look like, so I was basically floating around and looking glaikit until Mags pointed out the Newsnight crew, and the nice interviewer man figured out who I was.

    Archive 2007-02-01 Hal Duncan 2007

  • Said hi also to a few of the guys from Aereogramme after they'd finished up, but wasn't actually sure of who was there from Chemikal Underground or what they look like, so I was basically floating around and looking glaikit until Mags pointed out the Newsnight crew, and the nice interviewer man figured out who I was.

    Life is Sweeeeeeet, dude... Hal Duncan 2007

  • Leno says being pres is a lousy job for the money; McCain says the house is nice; Leno tells him he's got enough of those; McCain has no response and looks like an embarrassed glaikit.

    McCain on The Tonight Show 2008

  • Leno says being pres is a lousy job for the money; McCain says the house is nice; Leno tells him he's got enough of those; McCain has no response and looks like an embarrassed glaikit.

    McCain on The Tonight Show 2008

  • He looked up blankly, his mouth opening and closing like a particularly glaikit goldfish.

    Boiling a Frog Brookmyre, Christopher, 1968- 2005

  • As such, he was utterly made for the job, as his combination of physical clumsiness, verbal ineptitude and unwaveringly glaikit expression must have made even the most gauche and pallid code-cruncher feel like a cocksure sophisticate.

    Be My Enemy Brookmyre, Christopher, 1968- 2004

  • He had been here in another lifetime, just another glaikit Geography student on a field trip, and had marvelled at it like he was standing on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise.

    A Big Boy Did It and Ran Away Brookmyre, Christopher, 1968- 2001

  • He looked up blankly, his mouth opening and closing like a particularly glaikit goldfish.

    Boiling a frog Brookmyre, Christopher, 1968- 2000

  • Just think o 'Sim gettin' the dirty gae-bye frae a glaikit lassie hauf his age; and no 'his equal in the three parishes, wi' a leg to tak 'the ee o' a hal dancin'-school, and auld Knapdale's money comin 'till him whenever Knapdale's gane, and I'm hearin' he's in the deid-thraws already.

    Doom Castle Neil Munro

Comments

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  • The Urban Dictionary has a definition of glaikit.

    January 18, 2007

  • a bit vacant. away with the fairies. the lights are on but nobody is home sort of thing.

    July 23, 2007

  • Scottish in origin. Often describes a facial expression of blankness and uncertainty: eg "His face was pure glaikit"

    June 8, 2009

  • According to NPR's Says You: showing a lack of common sense and good judgement.

    May 9, 2010

  • I found glaikit in a book written by Alexander McCall Smith, The Charming Quirks of Others on page 185. It was published by Pantheon Books, New York, in 2010.

    ...There's a daughter, but she's not quite right, I believe. Unfortunately she's a bit glaikit." He used the Scots word for mental handicap. It was not a word that many used any more, preferring learning difficulties, the modern euphemism. But there was nothing unkind about glaikit, which survived because the policing of language had not extended to the Scots lexicon.

    August 27, 2014