schlock

English

Etymology

From Yiddish שלאַק (shlak), related to German Schlag (“blow, strike, hit”).

Pronunciation

Noun

schlock (countable and uncountable, plural schlocks)

  1. (colloquial, US) Any commodity that is shoddy or inferior; now, usually, writing or audiovisual content that is shoddy or inferior.
    Alternative form: shlock
    Synonyms: see Thesaurus:low-quality thing
    • 1978, Don DeLillo, Running Dog, New York: Knopf, page 148:
      Before pop art, there was such a thing as bad taste. Now there’s kitsch, schlock, camp and porn.
    • 1985 September 22, John Crowley, “St. Paul Meets Nero”, in The New York Times‎[1], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 26 July 2018:
      “The Kingdom of the Wicked” is not Mr. Burgess at the top of his bent. It is not schlock. It is too individual, too original for that; […] .
    • 2024 June 18, Spencer Klavan, “A Matter of Taste”, in The American Mind‎[2], archived from the original on 27 September 2026:
      And just because leftoids make tripe from their position of strength is no reason for trads to make schlock from their position of weakness.

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