down-and-dirty
Americanadjective
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unscrupulous; nasty.
a down-and-dirty election campaign.
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earthy; funky.
adjective
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ruthlessly competitive or underhand
if Bush gets down and dirty the Governor will give as good as he gets
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uninhibited; frank
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Vicious, not governed by rules of decency, as in The candidates are getting down and dirty early in the campaign . [ Slang ; early 1980s]
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Very earthy, uninhibitedly sexual. For example, “L.A. club people rarely get down and dirty on a dance floor” ( The New Yorker , May 21, 1990). [Late 1980s]
Etymology
Origin of down-and-dirty
First recorded in 1985–90
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“We like to go for a good mix of wild and crazy buildings but also down-and-dirty bridges,” Wolf said.
From Seattle Times • Aug. 23, 2022
But they did make it onto the stage, backed by a string quartet and tearing through the down-and-dirty riffs of their opening number, Smile.
From BBC • Jun. 24, 2022
“The Wild Goose Lake” is unapologetically down-and-dirty B-movie filmmaking, but with its stealth social commentary and matter-of-fact bleakness, you would never call it escapist entertainment.
From Los Angeles Times • May 22, 2019
In a phone interview from Los Angeles, he riffed about the down-and-dirty pleasures of “It’s Always Sunny,” Jersey love and how he’d like you to celebrate his special day.
From New York Times • Aug. 31, 2018
Wood got involved in a down-and-dirty lawsuit with the Cooke capitalists.
From The Hacker Crackdown, law and disorder on the electronic frontier by Sterling, Bruce
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
