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Glite Dictionary
👀 To stare curiously 👀 A curious onlooker
to rubberneck

to rubberneck

2 8.2
To stare at accidents or strange events and cause delay
  • verb
  • /ˈrʌbərˌnɛk/
  • Informal
translation icon : mirar con curiosidad
  • Most of them contain locals who've come to the airfield to rubberneck at the spectacle.
  • rubbernecking tourists
  • rubbernecking people
  • rubbernecked around

Examples

  • A school bus has overturned, and as the passing commuters rubberneck and bless themselves, the traffic clots.

    Fiction book (2000)

  • Unrolling his window, he rubbernecks a look outside.

    Fiction book (1995)

  • Same reason people rubberneck a car wreck.

    Blog text (15)

  • The room was filling up with kids, as though some accident had just occurred, and they were gathering around to rubberneck.

    Fiction book (1998)

  • She began to read it intently, and I, to my discredit, began to rubberneck.

    Blog text (7)

  • More like rubbernecking at some guy who drove into a ditch because he was admiring himself in the mirror instead of paying attention to the road.

    Blog text (26)

  • As the police car arrived, drivers slowed down to rubberneck at the accident on the highway.

  • People often rubberneck to see what happened when they pass by a traffic jam caused by an accident.

  • It's frustrating when drivers rubberneck, causing delays for everyone behind them.

Antonyms

to ignore
∞ 1.0

Choose not to pay attention to someone or something

to disregard
119 3.9

Ignore something or someone on purpose

How Curious

to stare
∞ 1.0
to gawk
  • Informal
27 6.1
to rubberneck
  • Informal
2 8.2
to look
∞ 1.0
to glance
299 1.5

Surface Forms

rubberneck infinitive
rubbernecked past
rubbernecked past participle
rubbernecking present participle
rubbernecks third person singular

Morphology

rubberneck = rubber + neck (semi-transparent) = rubber + neck

The verbal sense ('to stare') derives metaphorically from the compound image of stretching one's neck, so learners can guess the action but not the precise idiomatic use without context.

Etymology

Rubberneck as a verb comes from the same image of a neck stretching like rubber so a person can turn and look. So to rubberneck means 'to stare' at an accident or unusual event, often causing delay or danger.