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bangs

bangs

5 3.0
Hair at the front cut straight across the forehead
  • noun
  • /bæŋz/
  • US
translation icon : flequillo
  • She decided to get bangs to change up her hairstyle for the summer.

He got sunglasses over the bangs and he's a lifeguard.

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Examples

  • OK now it's time to pin up the bangs and get to business.

  • Bangs or "fringe" are ready to be cropped into your look as well!

    Blog text (19)
  • And also she cut my bangs pretty short too, which I wanted.

  • Blonde hair bangs with two clips on each side.

  • So I'm still like figuring out life with bangs, you know, kind of fun.

  • And then for the bangs, I'm just curling them to the side.

  • And in the movie Gravity, Sandra Bullock's bangs always pointed down.

  • Bangs reaches across the table, and William watches as he scribbles his number on the back of the kid's green collegiate notebook.

    Fiction book (2000)
  • Bangs searches for the album—vinyl flying everywhere now, with no regard for album jackets.

    Fiction book (2000)
  • Her stylist recommended that she try bangs to frame her face nicely.

Synonyms

bang
vsbangs
  • US
42 3.4

Short hair at the front that hangs over the forehead

is the whole hairstyle of front hair cut straight across the forehead
fringe
vsbangs
  • UK
13 3.1

A short border of hair that hangs across the forehead

is the same hairstyle but named differently in other dialects

Compounds

9.9

Hair at the front of the head styled to stick out from the forehead

Surface Forms

bangs singular
bangs plural

Morphology

bangs = bang (semi-transparent) = bang + s

Formally a plural of 'bang' but the hair meaning is lexicalized and the singular is uncommon, so learners may not deduce the sense from the base.

Etymology

Bangs for hair come from the word bang, which means 'a quick, sharp hit'. A helpful way to remember this is to imagine hair cut in one quick 'bang' straight across the forehead, so bangs sit short and even.