camp

noun

1. 1

   An outdoor place acting as temporary accommodation in tents or other simple structures.

   Near-synonyms: campsite, campground, encampment

   There's a big camp in the woods northwest of here. It's popular with hikers and bushcrafters.

2. 2

   An organised event, often taking place in tents or temporary accommodation.

   I met my best friend last summer at camp. She lives in Albany and plays the clarinet.

   He used to go to summer camp every alternate year.

   I met my girlfriend last summer at camp. You wouldn't know her — she lives in Canada.

3. 3

   A base of a military group, not necessarily temporary.

   Near-synonym: encampment

   Signs of enemy recon were found near their camp last week.

4. 4

   A place of politically motivated confinement in outdoorsy conditions, usually also leading to slave labor and death.

   Near-synonyms: concentration camp, labor camp, reeducation camp, gulag, stalag, prison camp

   Some say they'll round us all up into camps, but if they come for us, we'll take some out with us, on our way out.

   Mr. Ahn Myong-Chol was a prison guard at Camp 22 in Hoeryong and a driver at the camps. He was there between 1990 and 1994. He is the one who reported that prisoners had been used for human experimentation inside the camps.

5. 5

   A single hut or shelter.

   a hunter’s camp

6. 6

   The company or body of persons encamped.

   The camp broke up with the confusion of a flight.

7. 7

   A group of people with the same strong ideals or political leanings.

   Near-synonyms: faction, ingroup

   She's in the camp that speaks as if all vaccines were poisons.

8. 8

   obsoleteAn army.

   My Campe is like to Iulius Cæſars Hoſte, That neuer fought but had the victorie:

9. 9

   A site where kangaroos and other macropods rest during the day.

   ‘We must have sat down on a kangaroo camp when we boiled the billy at midday,’ I remarked irritably. Laurie laughed while I burned three kangaroo ticks from my legs.

10. 10

    slangAny prison or prison camp.

    Lantana is a sweet camp. It's an old hospital that has been converted to a drug treatment center for prisoners.

11. 11

    Anywhere that a colonist stayed when away from their permanent residence; such places collectively.

    Then the Rains came, when no one could go into camp, and the Narkarra Road was washed away by the Kasun River, and in the cup-like pastures of Kashima the cattle waded knee-deep.

12. 12

    obsoleteConflict; battle.

13. 13

    An online game, in some cases roleplay, in which people compete against each other, usually in a structure similar to that of a competition show.

14. 14

    A colony or other group of bats.

    The house owner got panic after seeing the camp of bats.

    Her mouth opens so wide, a camp of bats could fly in.

    The camp of bats then settled on the ceiling, hanging upside down with their beady eyes shining like stars in the torchlight.

15. 15

    Variant of campusClipping of campus

16. 16

    Variant of clampMisconstruction of clamp (“mound of earth in which potatoes and other vegetables are stored”).

verb

1. 1

   To live in a tent or similar temporary accommodation.

   We're planning to camp in the field until Sunday.

   A few hours before sundown we camped at a small playa lake sunk beneath the level of the grass.

2. 2

   To set up a camp.

3. 3

   To afford rest or lodging for.

   Had our great palace the capacity / To camp this host, we all would sup together.

4. 4

   To stay in an advantageous location.

   Some players like to camp next to a power-up's spawning point.

   ‘So things have gone all right with a little watchfulness and the help of old Cockeye here and her buck. They camp just there, right close to the hut, and have been real faithful these last two years.’

   Yet, even without the three second rule, where your big man could camp underneath and take those delightful “garbage” shots, there was little or no pivot offense, no cutting off the bucket.

5. 5

   To stay beside (something) to gain an advantage.

   The easiest way to win on this map is to camp the double damage.

   Go and camp the flag for the win.

6. 6

   Of stock animals, to assemble or rest temporarily at a particular place.

   The bullocks camped in front on the big fire, with the black line of trees facing them.

7. 7

   obsoleteTo fight; contend in battle or in any kind of contest; to strive with others in doing anything; compete.

   1562, Leigh, The Accedens of Armory ː Aristotle affirmeth that Rauens will gather together on sides, and campe and fight for victorie.

8. 8

   obsoleteTo wrangle; argue.

9. 9

   Variant of corpse campEllipsis of corpse camp.

noun

1. 1

   An affected, exaggerated, or intentionally tasteless style.

   Near-synonyms: campness, campiness

   We walk a fine line, just this side of camp. Careful calculations are made. We sense that while it might be wonderful for Krystle and Alexis to have a catfight in a koi pond, it would be inappropriate for Joan to smack Linda with a koi.

   Why would any Hollywood studio encourage a film's transformation into camp, in effect joining in the mockery of its own product? MGM declined to comment.

adjective

1. 1

   Theatrical; making exaggerated gestures.

2. 2

   Ostentatiously flamboyant or effeminate.

   More recently the word has become colloquial English for either implying that someone is a homosexual (‘he's very camp’), or for describing rather outre behaviour[…]

   And to be honest, in the illustration Mr Tumnus does look as camp as fuck with his little scarf tied jauntily around his neck. I suppose it isn't outside the realms of possibility that he'd just been off cottaging with some centaurs in the forest. God.

3. 3

   Intentionally tasteless or vulgar; self-parodying.

   In Saturday Night Live, Madonna also unsurprisingly played Princess Diana, Marilyn Monroe, and a Joan Collins clone, all in a very camp way. As John Dean writes: “U.S. rock has a ruling camp queen with Madonna.”

   Here is Eurovision from a time before anyone watched it for camp value – you can’t imagine any gay bar in 1974 clearing its schedules to screen this; a Eurovision that takes itself rather seriously, a brief appearance by the Wombles notwithstanding.

verb

1. 1

   To behave in a camp manner.

   Oster and his two co-stars, Jamie MacKenzie and Bill Martel, boogie and bop, sway and swish, camp and croon through tightly worked production numbers addressing a range of serious (and not so serious) issues that middle class, urban gay men come up against.

noun

1. 1

   slangThe areas of the Falkland Islands situated outside the capital and largest settlement, Stanley.

2. 2

   slangAn electoral constituency of the legislative assembly of the Falkland Islands that comprises all territory more than 3.5 miles from the spire of the Christ Church Cathedral in Stanley.

3. 3

   slangThe pampas, which are the vast grassy areas situated in the rural areas beyond Argentine cities such as Buenos Aires.

Forms

plural

camps

comparative

camper

superlative

campest

past tense

camped

past participle

camped

present participle

camping

third person singular

camps