hunch

1. (intransitive) To bend the top of one's body forward while raising one's shoulders.Examples: "Don't hunch over your computer if you want to avoid neck problems."; "Sandy, you will never get anywhere by hunching over your putter, hold your shoulders back and bend from the waist."; "She rolled over and hunched into a fetal position."Synonyms: slouch, stoop, leanintransitive

2. (transitive) To raise (one's shoulders) (while lowering one's head or bending the top of one's body forward); to curve (one's body) forward (sometimes followed by up).Examples: "They stood outside the door hunching themselves against the rain and puffing on their cigarettes."; "He hunched up his shoulders and stared down at the ground."; "Danc[ing] Mast[er]. […] not too fast […] keep you[r] leg[s] straight, […] don’t hunch up your shoulders so;"transitive

3. (intransitive) To walk (somewhere) while hunching one's shoulders.Examples: "[…] the figure hunched up the road."; "[…] once we had hunched in out of the sun and slunk through a cold pork-and-beans-on-bread lunch […] my brother and I found a desert creek nearby and heaved rocks at each other to cool off."; "1983, Jack Vance, Suldrun’s Garden, Spatterlight Press, 2012, Chapter 18, […] wheezing and grunting he hunched across the room."Synonyms: slouchintransitive

4. (transitive) To thrust a hump or protuberance out of (something); to crook, as the back.Examples: "[…] thou art all one errour; soul and body. The first young tryal of some unskill’d Pow’r; Rude in the making Art, and Ape of Jove. Thy crooked mind within hunch’d out thy back; And wander’d in thy limbs:"transitive

5. (transitive) To push or jostle with the elbow; to push or thrust against (someone).Examples: "After this, we saw a great Troop of Women upon the High-way to Hell, with their Bags; and their fellows, at their Heels, ever, and anon, hunching, and Justling one Another."; "Hickman, a great over-grown, lank-hair’d, chubby boy, who would be hunch’d and punch’d by every-body; and go home, with his finger in his eye, and tell his mother."; "He let his eyes scan the faces of all the white teachers, male and female, but would end up with a stare at the colored man sitting there. Finally, he hunched his seat-mate with his elbow and asked what man that was."Synonyms: elbow, nudgetransitive

6. (intransitive, colloquial) To have a hunch, or make an intuitive guess.Examples: "People who are instinctive hunchers go through some such process at every decision-making point of their lives. It is likely that children often make decisions and discern truths by hunching."colloquialintransitive