rubbish1 nounrubbish2 verbrubbish3 adjective
rubbishrub‧bish1 /ˈrʌbɪʃ/ ●●● S2 noun [uncountable] especially British English 
WORD ORIGINrubbish
Origin:
1300-1400 Anglo-French rubbous, perhaps from Old French robe; ➔ ROBEEXAMPLES FROM OTHER DICTIONARIES
- "What did you think of his speech?'' "I thought it was rubbish!''
- Don't forget to put the rubbish out before you go to bed.
- I don't know why you're watching that film, it's a load of old rubbish.
- I rescued this table from a rubbish dump.
- If you believe all this rubbish, you'll believe anything.
- The dustmen collect the rubbish on Wednesdays.
- There was rubbish and broken glass all over the grass.
- Two stolen paintings have been found dumped in a rubbish bin.
- But many places hate importing other people's rubbish.
- Disposal of our domestic rubbish is something we tend to forget about once it's been picked up by the dust-cart.
- Is the roof space clean and clear of rubbish?
- It's a load of rubbish.
- The majors were quite polite and everything, it wasn't like they were saying it was a load of rubbish.
- The most ubiquitous evidence was the piles of fly-tipped rubbish whenever we stopped to look for birds or flowers.
- Then nine tenths of the rubbish they've been printing for the last few weeks will be seen for what it is.
THESAURUS
especially British English things that people throw away, such as old food, dirty paper etc: · People are being encouraged to recycle their household rubbish.· the rubbish bin
American English rubbish: · The garbage is collected every Tuesday.· There were piles of trash in the backyard.· a black plastic garbage bag
formal rubbish: · The strike has disrupted refuse collection.· It’s a site which is used for domestic refuse.
empty bottles, pieces of paper etc that people have dropped on the ground: · Parents should teach children not to drop litter.· There was a lot of litter on the beach.
rubbish, or materials that need to be dealt with after they have been used in industrial processes: · nuclear waste· toxic waste· household waste· The company was fined for dumping toxic waste in the sea.
Longman Language Activatorto move over a surface while pressing against it British all the paper, empty bottles, cans, pieces of food etc that you throw away: · The dustmen collect the rubbish on Wednesdays.· There was rubbish and broken glass all over the grass.put/take out the rubbish (=put it in a rubbish bin outside your house ready to be collected): · Don't forget to put the rubbish out before you go to bed.a rubbish bin (=a container for rubbish): · Two stolen paintings have been found dumped in a rubbish bin.rubbish dump/tip (=a large open area where people's rubbish is taken after it is collected): · I rescued this table from a rubbish dump.
American all the paper, empty bottles, cans, pieces of food etc that you throw away: · There were piles of trash in the backyard.take out the garbage/trash (=put it in a garbage can outside your house ready to be collected): · I do all the chores, from picking up the groceries to taking out the garbage.garbage/trash can (=a container for garbage): · Will someone please empty this trash can!garbage truck (=a truck that takes away garbage): · Ken drives a garbage truck for a living.
paper that you throw away, especially because it has been used: · There are two bins. One is for glass and one is for waste paper.waste paper binBritish /waste paper basket American: · She crumpled the letter up and put it in the waste paper basket.
empty bottles, packets, and pieces of paper that people have dropped on the street or in a park: · These streets are full of litter.drop litter: · You can be fined £100 for dropping litter.pick up litter: · I am tired of picking up litter thrown by other people.litter binBritish /litter basket American (=a container for litter): · a picnic area with large wooden tables and litter bins
formal all the things that are regularly thrown away from the houses, shops etc in an area: · Heaps of decaying refuse littered every street. refuse collection: · Refuse collection has been seriously affected by the strike.refuse disposal (=destroying or burying refuse): · We are gradually developing safer and more effective methods of refuse disposal.household/domestic refuse (=refuse from houses): · facilities for recycling household refuse
useless materials which are left over, especially after an industrial process, and which must be thrown away: · Too much waste has been dumped into the North Sea.industrial/chemical/nuclear waste: · Industrial waste had leaked into the water supply.radioactive/toxic/hazardous waste: · The government has announced a ban on all imports of toxic waste from abroad.waste disposal (=destroying or burying waste): · The costs of waste disposal are rising all the time.
bad films/books/methods/food etc something that is bad is of a low standard, because it has been done badly, designed badly, performed badly etc: · The movie was so bad that we left before it finished.· It's the worst book she's ever written.· Opponents of the plan say it is a bad way of managing city traffic.· In the 1980s, their cars had a bad reputation for reliability.· Their latest album is even worse than their last one.
spoken not good at all: · I wouldn't go there - the food's no good.· I've tried that diet, and it's no good.
very bad: · That's such an awful programme! How can you watch it?· Your handwriting is appalling.· The food was lousy and the service was terrible.
especially British very bad: · The coffee tasted dreadful!· "How did you like the film?'' "I thought it was dreadful.''
British informal /garbage especially American use this to describe something you think is very bad: · "What did you think of his speech?'' "I thought it was rubbish!''· Most of the food in these fast food joints is garbage.a load of rubbish/garbage: · I don't know why you're watching that film, it's a load of old rubbish.· I've never read such a load of garbage in my life.
informal use this to describe something you think is very bad -- some people think this word is offensive: · There's nothing but crap on television these days.· The stereo's great but the rest of the car is crap.a load of crap: · Someone told me it was a really interesting museum, but I thought it was a load of crap.
especially American, informal if you say that something sucks , you think it is very bad -- some people think this word is offensive: · Let's not go there -- the food sucks.
what you say when you think something is untrue British spoken also bull American spoken use this when you think something is totally untrue and stupid: · I don't know where he got that idea, it's total bull.· You don't believe that rubbish, do you?· That's nonsense. Don't be silly.
spoken also a pile of American spoken use this when you think everything that someone has said or written about something is stupid and completely untrue: a load of nonsense/rubbish British: · I told Julia what he'd said, and she said that it was a load of nonsense.· That article is a load of rubbish, if you ask me.
WORD SETSaesthete, nounagitprop, nounart gallery, nounartist, nounartwork, nounavant-garde, adjectivebaroque, adjectivecapture, verbceramics, nouncharacter, nounclassical, adjectiveclassicism, nouncompere, nouncontemporary, adjectiveconvention, nouncreative, adjectivecritical, adjectivecrossover, nouncubism, nouncultural, adjectiveculturally, adverbculture, nouncurator, nouncycle, noundrama, nouneisteddfod, nounepic, nouneponymous, adjectiveerotic, adjectiveerotica, nouneroticism, nounexhibit, verbexhibit, nounexhibition, nounexpress, verbexpression, nounexpressionism, nounextract, nounfictionalize, verbfigurine, nounfin de siècle, adjectiveflashback, nounformalism, nounfuturism, nounglaze, verbglaze, nounGothic, adjectivehandcrafted, adjectivehandicraft, nounhandmade, adjectivehigh priest, nounhistorical, adjectiveinterpretation, nounItalianate, adjectivelowbrow, adjectivemagnum opus, nounmarquetry, nounmasterpiece, nounmasterwork, nounmature, adjectivemedium, nounMFA, nounmiddlebrow, adjectiveminimalism, nounmotif, nounmuse, nounnarrator, nounnaturalism, nounneoclassical, adjectivenotice, nounoeuvre, nounoffering, nounopening, adjectiveopus, nounpan, verbparody, nounpastiche, nounpattern, nounpiece, nounpop art, nounportfolio, nounpostmodernism, nounprequel, nounpreview, nounproduce, verbproduction, nounrealism, nounrealistic, adjectiverehash, verbreview, nounreview, verbromantic, nounromanticism, nounroyalty, nounrubbish, nounsalon, nounscenario, nounscene, nounsensuous, adjectivesentimental, adjectivesequel, nounsequence, nounset piece, nounsetting, nounShakespearean, adjectiveshowing, nounskit, nounstory, nounstudio, nounstylistic, adjectivesurrealism, nounswansong, nounsynopsis, nountitle, nountrilogy, nountwo-dimensional, adjectiveuncut, adjectiveunexpurgated, adjectivevillain, nounwork, nounwork of art, noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM THE ENTRY
a rubbish bin household rubbish You do talk rubbish sometimes. That’s a load of rubbish. The suggestion is absolute rubbish.
a rubbish bin household rubbish (=a place to take rubbish)
You do talk rubbish sometimes. That’s a load of rubbish. The suggestion is absolute rubbish. spoken (=used to tell someone that what they have just said is completely wrong)
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES· The rubbish bin is full.
British English Many older people feel they have been consigned to the medical scrapheap.
Many older people feel they have been consigned to the medical scrapheap. British English, garbage dump American English The fire probably started in a rubbish dump.
COLLOCATIONS FROM THE CORPUSADJECTIVE The fire probably started in a rubbish dump.· All those stories about Sandra being mistaken for Lady Lucan are absolute rubbish as far as I am concerned.· Male speaker Absolute rubbish! - it's the best amateur-professional show.
· My wife treats ours like a second handbag - it's full of rubbish.· I went into the garden and I found the wheelbarrow was full of rubbish.· He kicked himself when he discovered it behind two large metal waste bins full of rubbish and old cardboard.· The black sacks full of fetid rubbish that are to be seen in Lambeth do not meet the eye on entering Wandsworth.· The entrance is a brief concrete patio with three smelly skips about four feet high and full of rubbish.
· Instead of being ashamed of our antiques, he is proud of the old rubbish!· Tell me a load of old rubbish!· The sourness of old rubbish fires hangs in the air.
NOUN· Yesterday we found a baby that some one had thrown into a rubbish bin in the street.· Oracle has denied knowledge of the detective agency's methods, which included sifting through rubbish bins.· Logic insists that Sebastian should have set a match to this vile document and consigned it to the rubbish bin.· Even the rubbish bins were empty.· The flakes of mud would have been carefully removed and put in the rubbish bin in the kitchen.· Beneath the window is a bilingual rubbish bin with a spelling mistake.· Most people think of waste as being the contents of the domestic rubbish bin.
· There should be some kind of rubbish disposal facility and you need proper campsites for the trekkers, with camp wardens.
· They've agreed to postpone development of a rubbish dump for at least 10 years.· Here there was a natural beach, bordered by a thin band of scrub: beyond it was the council rubbish dump.· Rubbish raid: Thieves broke into a rubbish dump near Ripon.· But over the past century we have made it into a rubbish dump.· They searched for the money-filled teddy bear and were told it had been tossed on to a rubbish dump.· With such vandals for subjects, it was fitting that they chose the Adam's Pass rubbish dump as their study site.· Having escaped from their field, two goats wandered around for a while until they found themselves in a rubbish dump.· People have become ever more hostile to the idea of living near a rubbish dump.
· What are possibly the rubbish heaps of Our Mutual Friend loomed even larger in fact than they do in fiction.· He was about to be thrown back on the bloody rubbish heap, or worse.· The habitat of the ink cap is in grass, rubbish heaps and on disturbed soil.
· Finding things to make out of unwanted household rubbish will always be technically difficult.· Furthermore, mixing up used disposables with the rest of the household rubbish makes it difficult to recycle them afterwards.· This is particularly true of household rubbish.
· Did she take it with her when she went to the rubbish skip or dash to a stationer's and buy it?· At the comer stood a green plastic rubbish skip, presumably the one where Ruggiero's letter had been left.· Apparently a lorry carrying a rubbish skip was hi-jacked in nearby Pomeroy several hours ago and the driver held at gunpoint.
· The device is being used at landfill rubbish tips and can tell scientists within minutes precisely what's going on underground.· During those sixty seconds of biological time, Modern Man has made a rubbish tip of Paradise.· Trashing lives At night on the city rubbish tip in La Paz, strange things start to happen.· Municipal rubbish tips are some of the most important feeding areas for gulls, crows, vultures and kites.· Jones had tried to cover his tracks by disposing of some of the apparatus on a rubbish tip.· The time has come to find a solution to prevent Britain becoming one big, dangerous rubbish tip.· With this rubbish tip of information she then came to me to ask how she could write it up into a dissertation.
VERB· Is the roof space clean and clear of rubbish?
· But new measures have been taken, and sweeping machines constantly ply the main streets collecting rubbish.· The districts collect the rubbish ... take responsibility for housing ... and look after certain environmental services.
· Logic insists that Sebastian should have set a match to this vile document and consigned it to the rubbish bin.· The contents were immediately consigned to the rubbish tip and the girl forcibly removed in the direction of the bath huts.
· The flakes of mud would have been carefully removed and put in the rubbish bin in the kitchen.· All the reject packaging was put into the special rubbish barrel in case we needed it for some other purpose.
· Don't talk rubbish, girl!· People who talk about authentic costume are talking rubbish.· Behave like everyone else. Talk a lot of rubbish in the right tone of voice.· I was so high on adrenalin that for all I knew I was talking utter rubbish.
· Do not throw rubbish on to an open fire in the living room.· Yesterday we found a baby that some one had thrown into a rubbish bin in the street.· One small town has stopped householders throwing out garden rubbish.· And he'd thrown that rubbish out.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
1food, paper etc that is no longer needed and has been thrown away SYN garbage, trash American English: - A man talking sense to himself is no madder than a man talking nonsense not to himself.
- Don't talk rubbish, girl!
- He had already tried to talk sense into Jotan, and had got nowhere.
- It was easy to laugh in that snug house, talk nonsense half the night, drink.
- People who talk about authentic costume are talking rubbish.
- Quinn realized that he was talking nonsense.
a rubbish bin household rubbishrubbish tip/dump (=a place to take rubbish)2informal objects, papers etc that you no longer use and should throw away: I’ve got so much rubbish on my desk it’s unbelievable.3informal an idea, statement etc that is rubbish is silly or wrong and does not deserve serious attention SYN nonsense, garbage American English: You do talk rubbish sometimes. That’s a load of rubbish. The suggestion is absolute rubbish.rubbish! spoken (=used to tell someone that what they have just said is completely wrong)4informal a film, book etc that is rubbish is very bad: the usual Hollywood rubbishTHESAURUSrubbish especially British English things that people throw away, such as old food, dirty paper etc: · People are being encouraged to recycle their household rubbish.· the rubbish bingarbage/trash American English rubbish: · The garbage is collected every Tuesday.· There were piles of trash in the backyard.· a black plastic garbage bagrefuse formal rubbish: · The strike has disrupted refuse collection.· It’s a site which is used for domestic refuse.litter empty bottles, pieces of paper etc that people have dropped on the ground: · Parents should teach children not to drop litter.· There was a lot of litter on the beach.waste rubbish, or materials that need to be dealt with after they have been used in industrial processes: · nuclear waste· toxic waste· household waste· The company was fined for dumping toxic waste in the sea.rubbish1 nounrubbish2 verbrubbish3 adjective
rubbishrubbish2 verb [transitive] VERB TABLE
rubbish
| Simple Form | ||
| Present | I, you, we, they | rubbish |
| he, she, it | rubbishes | |
| Past | I, you, he, she, it, we, they | rubbished |
| Present perfect | I, you, we, they | have rubbished |
| he, she, it | has rubbished | |
| Past perfect | I, you, he, she, it, we, they | had rubbished |
| Future | I, you, he, she, it, we, they | will rubbish |
| Future perfect | I, you, he, she, it, we, they | will have rubbished |
| Continuous Form | ||
| Present | I | am rubbishing |
| he, she, it | is rubbishing | |
| you, we, they | are rubbishing | |
| Past | I, he, she, it | was rubbishing |
| you, we, they | were rubbishing | |
| Present perfect | I, you, we, they | have been rubbishing |
| he, she, it | has been rubbishing | |
| Past perfect | I, you, he, she, it, we, they | had been rubbishing |
| Future | I, you, he, she, it, we, they | will be rubbishing |
| Future perfect | I, you, he, she, it, we, they | will have been rubbishing |
EXAMPLES FROM THE CORPUS
- He did so by rubbishing the only viable goal of any Liberal Democrat election campaign - a hung parliament.
- I've done my share of rubbishing believe me!
- It is time we began to ask who are these women who rubbish men.
- On the higher literary level it rubbished quite a bit of Hardy and much of D.H.Lawrence.
- The government will be claiming that its reform of legal aid was a triumph for justice and any dissent will be rubbished.
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
· The rubbish bin is full.
British English Many older people feel they have been consigned to the medical scrapheap.
Many older people feel they have been consigned to the medical scrapheap. British English, garbage dump American English The fire probably started in a rubbish dump.
The fire probably started in a rubbish dump.PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
British English to say something is bad or useless- A man talking sense to himself is no madder than a man talking nonsense not to himself.
- Don't talk rubbish, girl!
- He had already tried to talk sense into Jotan, and had got nowhere.
- It was easy to laugh in that snug house, talk nonsense half the night, drink.
- People who talk about authentic costume are talking rubbish.
- Quinn realized that he was talking nonsense.
rubbish1 nounrubbish2 verbrubbish3 adjective
rubbishrubbish3 adjective British English informal COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
· The rubbish bin is full.
British English Many older people feel they have been consigned to the medical scrapheap.
Many older people feel they have been consigned to the medical scrapheap. British English, garbage dump American English The fire probably started in a rubbish dump.
The fire probably started in a rubbish dump.PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
not skilful at a particular activity: - A man talking sense to himself is no madder than a man talking nonsense not to himself.
- Don't talk rubbish, girl!
- He had already tried to talk sense into Jotan, and had got nowhere.
- It was easy to laugh in that snug house, talk nonsense half the night, drink.
- People who talk about authentic costume are talking rubbish.
- Quinn realized that he was talking nonsense.
a rubbish team