swot
nounEtymology From a dialectal English word, from Middle English swot, swat, from Old English swāt (“perspiration; sweat”), from Proto-Germanic *swaitą (“sweat”). More at sweat.
- He liked Tom all right... Sampson and Bullock he could do without, however. Especially Sampson, who was too much of a grammar-school-type swot ever to be quite the thing.1991, Stephen Fry, The Liar, page 23:
- The popular science bit goes like this. Your brain has two hemispheres, left and right. The left is the organised swot who likes bright light, keeps his bedroom tidy and can tolerate sums. Your right hemisphere is your brain on drugs: the long-haired, creative type you don't bring home to mother.2006 April 18, Philip Beadle, “Mind maps: rubbish in theory, but handy in practice”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:
1 more example
- On first listen, Americans of a certain vintage would call one a Poindexter, while older Brits would regard the other as a swot.2023 August 8, Janan Ganesh, “The oneness of Ron DeSantis and Rishi Sunak”, in Financial Times:
- All I want is — guerre fini, soldat fini; and to go home without burden of any thought save music, and hard swot for a time.Quoted in 1983, Ivor Gurney, Robert Kelsey Rought Thornton, War Letters: A Selection (page 254)
- Derived terms
- swotty