Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To move in a lively or bouncy manner.
  • intransitive verb To move with exaggerated or affected motions.
  • intransitive verb To move clumsily; flounder.
  • noun The act or motion of flouncing.
  • noun A strip of decorative, usually gathered or pleated material attached by one edge, as on a garment or curtain.
  • transitive verb To trim with a strip or strips of gathered or pleated material.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In saddlery, a covering for a pistol-holster, either of leather or bearskin.
  • To deck with flounces: as, to flounce a petticoat or a gown.
  • To surround with something arranged like a flounce.
  • noun A deep ruffle; a strip of any material used to decorate a garment, especially a skirt near the bottom, gathered or plaited at one edge, and loose and floating at the other, the gathered edge being sewed to the garment.
  • To make abrupt or agitated movements with the limbs and body; turn or twist as with sudden petulance or impatience; move with flings or turns, as if in displeasure or annoyance: as, to flounce out of a room.
  • noun A sudden fling or turn, as of the body.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun An ornamental appendage to the skirt of a woman's dress, consisting of a strip gathered and sewed on by its upper edge around the skirt, and left hanging.
  • intransitive verb To throw the limbs and body one way and the other; to spring, turn, or twist with sudden effort or violence; to struggle, as a horse in mire; to flounder; to throw one's self with a jerk or spasm, often as in displeasure.
  • noun The act of floucing; a sudden, jerking motion of the body.
  • transitive verb To deck with a flounce or flounces.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb To move in an exaggerated, bouncy manner.
  • verb archaic : To flounder; to make spastic motions.
  • verb To decorate with a flounce.
  • verb To leave a group dramatically, in a way that draws attention to oneself.
  • noun sewing A strip of decorative material, usually pleated, attached along one edge; a ruffle.
  • noun The act of flouncing.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the act of walking with exaggerated jerky motions
  • noun a strip of pleated material used as a decoration or a trim
  • verb walk emphatically

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Possibly of Scandinavian origin.]

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Alteration of frounce, from Middle English, pleat, from Old French fronce, of Germanic origin; see sker- in Indo-European roots.]

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Examples

  • The comment by conservatism is my antidrug @ 111 is what is called a flounce, the troll is begging to have this sock-puppet banned.

    Think Progress » The Party of Lincoln falls short on civil rights. 2010

  • In another town the awning from a shop window must not exceed a certain length, and you are told of a poor widow, who, having just had a new one put up at great expense, was compelled by the police to take the whole thing down, because the flounce was a quarter of an inch longer than the regulations prescribed.

    Home Life in Germany Alfred Sidgwick 1894

  • The muslin gowns had been very successful; the skirts fell in a straight line from the waistband high under their arms to their feet, one with a little edge of fine white embroidery, the other with a frill scarcely to be called a flounce round the foot.

    Kirsteen: The Story of a Scotch Family Seventy Years Ago Margaret 1891

  • What you all made fun of as a "flounce" out of the conversation I saw as frustration at being treated like a piece of dirt.

    Making Light: The "agency model" as I understand it 2010

  • She flounced -- 'flounce' was the only appropriate word!

    The Beetle Richard Marsh

  • A market-woman with her jolly brown face and laughing brown eyes — eyes all the softer for a touch of antimony — her ample form clothed in a lively print overall, made with a yoke at the shoulders, and a full long flounce which is gathered on to the yoke under the arms and falls fully to the feet; with her head done up in a yellow or red handkerchief, and her snowy white teeth gleaming through her vast smiles, is a mighty pleasant thing to see, and to talk to.

    Travels in West Africa 2003

  • A market-woman with her jolly brown face and laughing brown eyes -- eyes all the softer for a touch of antimony -- her ample form clothed in a lively print overall, made with a yoke at the shoulders, and a full long flounce which is gathered on to the yoke under the arms and falls fully to the feet; with her head done up in a yellow or red handkerchief, and her snowy white teeth gleaming through her vast smiles, is a mighty pleasant thing to see, and to talk to.

    Travels in West Africa Mary H. Kingsley 1881

  • And the ease of self-publishing is fueling this; it's fueling the rage at the so-called "gatekeepers" and allowing authors to vent without fear of reprisal because they're just going to flounce off and publish their books by themselves.

    Melanie Benjamin: Stop the Insanity and Just Write, Already Melanie Benjamin 2010

  • And the ease of self-publishing is fueling this; it's fueling the rage at the so-called "gatekeepers" and allowing authors to vent without fear of reprisal because they're just going to flounce off and publish their books by themselves.

    Melanie Benjamin: Stop the Insanity and Just Write, Already Melanie Benjamin 2010

  • And the ease of self-publishing is fueling this; it's fueling the rage at the so-called "gatekeepers" and allowing authors to vent without fear of reprisal because they're just going to flounce off and publish their books by themselves.

    Melanie Benjamin: Stop the Insanity and Just Write, Already Melanie Benjamin 2010

Comments

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  • "When you took your seat with womanish care, lifting your billowy flounces, on the smoothworn throne." Joyce, Ulysses, 15

    January 1, 2008

  • If a woman can flounce, I think she's got me.

    October 24, 2008

  • You mean walk with exaggerated jerky motions? (See WeirdNet #3.)

    October 24, 2008

  • Silly walks!

    October 24, 2008

  • "6. In saddlery, a covering for a pistol-holster, either of leather or bearskin."

    --Century Dictionary

    March 10, 2011