Snakehead

noun, slang

noun, slang ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A family of perciform fish native to Africa and Asia, Channidae.

    "Through this plantation ran a creek full of snakeheads and eels, its overflow swelling the swamp around it."

  2. 2
    showy perennial of marshlands of eastern and central North America having waxy lanceolate leaves and flower with lower part creamy white and upper parts pale pink to deep purple wordnet
  3. 3
    A Chinese smuggler, especially one who smuggles people. slang

    "Why would they want to run? -- To get away from the snakeheads. -- What's that? -- The snakeheads pay to get them here and then they gotta work off what they owe."

  4. 4
    A black person. US, derogatory, ethnic, slang, slur
  5. 5
    A showy perennial plant, Chelone glabra, found in North American marshlands; the turtlehead
Show 2 more definitions
  1. 6
    A loose, bent-up end of one of the strap rails, or flat rails, formerly used on American railroads. US
  2. 7
    Alternative form of snake's head, various not closely related species of flowering plant, including Fritillaria meleagris. alt-of, alternative, rare

Synonyms

All synonyms
chelone glabrashell-flowershellflowershellflowersnake-headturtlehead

Example

More examples

"Through this plantation ran a creek full of snakeheads and eels, its overflow swelling the swamp around it."

Etymology

From snake + head.

Related phrases

giant snakeheadnorthern snakehead

More for "snakehead"

SynonymsSentencesPronunciationTranslate

Next best steps

Find stronger synonymsSee usage examplesCheck pronunciationBrowse writing guides

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.