stack
stack
Pronunciation
The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) spelling for stack is /stæk/.
It's a single-syllable word composed of four distinct sounds:
s - /s/ - A voiceless fricative sound made by forcing air through a narrow channel at the front of the tongue.
t - /t/ - A voiceless stop sound made by briefly blocking airflow with the tip of the tongue against the alveolar ridge.
a - /æ/ - An open front unrounded vowel, like the 'a' in "cat" or "trap".
ck - /k/ - A voiceless stop sound made by blocking airflow with the back of the tongue against the soft palate.
Word Form Variations
Noun (singular): stack
Noun (plural): stacks
Verb (base): stack
Verb (third-person present): stacks
Verb (past tense & past participle): stacked
Verb (present participle/gerund): stacking
Definitions, Synonyms and Antonyms
Noun
A neat, orderly pile of items arranged one on top of another. 🥞
Synonyms: pile, heap, mound, bundle
Antonyms: mess, jumble, disarray, scatter
(Informal) A large quantity or amount of something.
Synonyms: load, ton, abundance, slew
Antonyms: handful, scarcity, bit, lack
(Computing) A data structure where elements are added and removed from the same end, following a "last-in, first-out" (LIFO) principle.
Synonyms: LIFO queue, push-down list
Antonyms: queue, FIFO
(Usually plural, "stacks") The main area of a library where books are shelved. 📚
Synonyms: bookshelves, bookstacks, shelves
Antonyms: reading room, circulation desk
Verb
To arrange items into a neat pile, typically one on top of the other.
Synonyms: pile, heap, assemble, arrange
Antonyms: scatter, disperse, unstack, jumble
To manipulate a situation to create an unfair advantage or disadvantage.
Synonyms: rig, fix, bias, load
Antonyms: equalize, randomize, play fair
Examples of Use
In Literature
As a noun, referring to a physical pile:
He took out a pile of shirts and began throwing them, one by one, before us, shirts of sheer linen and thick silk and fine flannel, which lost their folds as they fell and covered the table in many-colored disarray. While we admired, he brought more and the soft rich heap mounted higher—shirts with stripes and scrolls and plaids in coral and apple-green and lavender and faint orange, with monograms of Indian blue. Suddenly, with a strained sound, Daisy bent her head into the shirts and began to cry stormily. “They’re such beautiful shirts,” she sobbed, her voice muffled in the thick stack.
(F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby)
In News & Online Publications
As a verb, meaning to arrange unfairly:
"Democrats are also leery of a process they warn could be used to stack the convention with Trump loyalists and make it harder for other voices in the party to be heard."
(The New York Times, February 2024)
As a noun, referring to a technology suite:
"The MERN stack is a popular choice for web developers, comprising four key open-source technologies: MongoDB, Express.js, React, and Node.js. Together, they provide a full-stack framework for building dynamic websites and applications."
(IBM Technology blog)
In Entertainment
In music, referring to a large amount of money:
"All I wanna do is [gunshots and a cash register sound] and take your money."
The lyric is widely interpreted as "All I wanna do is pop-pop-pop-pop and get a stack of money."
(M.I.A., "Paper Planes")
In film, referring to a pile of gambling chips:
"You can shear a sheep many times, but you can only skin him once. First, I'm going to shear him. I'm going to take that whole stack."
(Character Mike McDermott in the film Rounders)
In General Discourse
As an adjective, meaning well-equipped or muscular:
"Their basketball team is completely stacked this year; they have three all-stars in the starting lineup."
As part of an idiom, referring to losing one's temper:
"After the third time his computer crashed, he completely blew his stack and slammed his keyboard on the desk."
As a common noun for a food item:
"For breakfast on weekends, my favorite thing to order is a short stack of buttermilk pancakes with extra syrup." 🥞
10 Famous Quotes Using Stack
"I see the dear old brick house, and the handsome old hall, and the ugly old clock, and the great stack of chimneys." (Charles Dickens, David Copperfield)
"I have a great stack of letters I've been meaning to write..." (Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath)
"Be a little kinder than you have to. A stack of books. A yummy meal. A bed to sleep in. We are so lucky." (E. Lockhart, We Were Liars)
"I've got a great stack of records that I love to listen to." (Henry Rollins)
"First, I'm going to shear him. I'm going to take that whole stack." (Mike McDermott, Rounders)
Justice should be a level scale, not a stack of weights favoring one side.
A new stack of books is a promise of worlds yet to be discovered.
You cannot solve all the world's problems, but you can solve the problem of a missing stack of pancakes.
Innovation is often just one new idea placed atop a very old stack of technologies.
A single brick is a stone, but a stack of them can be a home.
Etymology
The word stack has its roots in a language spoken by Vikings.
It comes to English from the Old Norse word stakkr, which meant "a haystack." The first known use of "stack" in English appeared around the 13th century, and it meant exactly what the Old Norse word meant: a large, neatly piled mound of hay, grain, or straw.
Think of those tall, cone-shaped piles you might see in old paintings of farmlands—that's the original "stack."
Over time, the meaning expanded from just hay to refer to any orderly pile of things, one on top of the other, like a stack of books, plates, or money. The verb form, "to stack," emerged later, simply describing the action of creating such a pile. The core idea has always been about piling things up in an organized way.
Phrases + Idioms Containing Stack
Blow one's stack: To become suddenly and violently angry; to lose one's temper.
Example: "He completely blew his stack when he saw the scratch on his car."Stack the deck: To cheat or arrange a situation unfairly to ensure a desired outcome.
Example: "The hiring process was a sham; they stacked the deck in favor of the CEO's nephew."The odds are stacked against you: The circumstances or conditions are arranged in a way that makes success very unlikely.
Example: "Starting a new business in this economy is tough; the odds are stacked against you from the start."Stack up against: To compare or measure up to something or someone else, usually in terms of quality or ability.
Example: "Let's see how our latest sales figures stack up against our main competitor's."A short stack: A small serving of pancakes, usually two or three. 🥞
Example: "I'm not that hungry, so I'll just get a short stack."Full-stack: A term, primarily from computer programming, describing a person or technology that deals with all layers of a system (e.g., front-end, back-end, database).
Example: "The company is looking to hire a full-stack developer who can manage the entire application."Stacks of...: An informal way of saying a large quantity of something.
Example: "I have stacks of paperwork to get through before the end of the day."Like finding a needle in a haystack: A related idiom referring to something that is virtually impossible to find because it is hidden among a vast quantity of other things.
Example: "Searching for that one specific email in my inbox is like trying to find a needle in a haystack."Top of the stack: The most recent, urgent, or highest-priority item needing attention (derived from the "last-in, first-out" computing concept).
Example: "This new security threat is now at the top of the stack for the IT department."
Vocabulary-Based Stories from SEA
Source Information
Definition of stack from The Academic Glossary at Self Exploration Academy, a Urikville Press Publication. © All rights reserved.
