Haze

How to spell haze

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce haze

What does haze mean?

1. nounA thin mist of fine dust, smoke, or moisture that makes the air slightly cloudy and dims visibility.
2. nounA state of mental confusion or dullness in which thinking feels unclear.
3. verbTo subject newcomers to humiliating or harassing initiation tasks, especially in clubs or teams.

Haze in a sentence

• noun

  A faint haze hung over the motorway in the afternoon heat.

• noun

  After the long flight she moved through the morning in a complete haze.

• verb

  The fraternity was banned for trying to haze first-year recruits.

• noun

  Smoke from the distant fires left a grey haze across the valley.

• noun

  The days after the operation passed in a painkiller haze.

• verb

  Team rules now forbid older players to haze the rookies.

Where does haze come from?

Language of origin: Unknown

The origin of 'haze' is genuinely uncertain, which is unusual for such an everyday word. It surfaces in English in the late 1600s, and many lexicographers believe it was a back-formation from the slightly earlier adjective 'hazy', which described thick or foggy weather. Where 'hazy' itself came from is debated: one leading suggestion links it to the Old English word 'hasu' or 'haswe', meaning grey or dusky, which would tie it to native Germanic roots. Another line of thought connects the nautical sense of harassing a crew with relentless work to the Old French 'haser', meaning to annoy or irritate, which may have fed the modern 'hazing' sense. Because the trails cross and none is firmly proven, the safest summary is that 'haze' is of obscure origin; the spelling stays simple, just one syllable ending in a silent 'e' that keeps the long vowel.

How the word is built

• haze (single root; likely a back-formation from the adjective 'hazy')