Shirt-sleeve
adj, noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 Alternative form of shirt sleeve. alt-of, alternative
"Not one of those rustic wassals of the Ouse of Widdlers, but ad his air curled and his shirt-sleaves tied up with pink ribbing as he led to the macy dance some appy country gal, with a black velvit boddice and a redd or yaller petticoat, a hormylu cross on her neck, and a silver harrow in her air!"
- 1 Having an informal, relaxed appearance or approach, particularly in business. not-comparable
"He had a shirt-sleeve style of management."
- 2 That allows working without the need of wearing a spacesuit. not-comparable
"The Exploration Cooling Garment shall allow a crewmember to maintain their nominal shirt-sleeve range of motion."
Example
More examples"He had a shirt-sleeve style of management."
Etymology
The adjective sense is derived from the practice of taking one’s jacket off and relaxing in shirt sleeves.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.