Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The act or an instance of cutting the hair.
  • noun A style in which hair is cut.
  • noun Slang A reduction, as in payment or value.

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

  • noun The act of cutting of the hair, often done professionally by a barber, hair stylist, or beautician.
  • noun The way hair is cut.
  • noun law In a bankruptcy proceeding, the proportional reduction in the debt that will be paid to each creditor, based on an evaluation of the total debt owed and the total assets of the debtor.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the style in which hair has been cut
  • noun the act of cutting the hair

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From hair + cut

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Examples

Comments

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  • "I now live in one of the poorest places in Britain. The teenagers here have expensive haircuts, fashionable clothes and mobile phones. Most of those who are old enough have cars, which they drive incessantly and write off every few weeks." - 'Bring On The Recession', George Monbiot, 9 Oct 2007.

    December 12, 2007

  • See also trichotomy.

    May 4, 2008

  • I don't quite understand your invocation of the suffix 'tomy' here to indicate hair'cut'. The standard Greek suffix to indicate 'cut, excision, or surgical removal' is 'ectomy', so you would have to say 'trichectomy', not 'trichotomy'.

    on edit: the point being, I think, that when hair is cut, it implies removal, as opposed to the kind of incision or dissection that 'otomy' might imply for a different body organ.

    May 4, 2008

  • This is the point: trichectomy would mean cutting your hair... off (in a surgical way). Trichotomy does mean haircut, it's not one of my madeupical terms! The ancient Greek word τομή means "cut" (τέμνω = to cut).

    If it can help, google search for pubic trichotomy or abdominal trichotomy.

    May 5, 2008

  • "In November 2005, the house sold for $126,000. The bank, which took it back last spring, is asking $59,000. The Seattle man offers $40,000.

    The mayor says the lender is not desperate enough to take that big a haircut. “Not going to happen,�? she says."

    The New York Times, In the Central Valley, the Ruins of the Housing Bust, by David Streitfeld, August 23, 2008

    August 24, 2008