Meaning of yardfowl | Babel Free

Definitions

1. A chicken raised in a yard.
2. A political sycophant.
   Barbados

Examples

“It alſo feeds Pheaſants, Partridges, Pidgeons, Yard-Fowls, &c., very expeditiously.”

“On the third and fourth shelves are the different races of domestic fowls, and near them several wild species from India and the Moluccas. It cannot yet be decided from which of them our common yard fowls have sprung.”

“What ravishments, inaccessible to us, may not be written there, where the awakened yardfowl carves her fluid sport, to remotest whispers of the eagle's flight.”

“By then Torin had used Brinda's pebbles to buy wine, bread, and a little yardfowl meat, so he had to give her their worth in other toys.”

“Then he dragged her and kicked her naked out into the yard before the eyes of the yard fowl and mule and two stricken, terrified children.”

“Oh, how pleased will Cromus be to read the boy's intestinal fortitude – a deal more accurate than the innards of yardfowl, he claims; they're sure to unblock those dream paths, as he calls them, [...]”

“Our mother kept a dozen chickens, two turkeys, a few ducks and a guinea fowl. They were our ‘yard fowls’. She had caused our father to build coops of wood, board and wire-netting for them. We kept the yard fowls cooped up during the planting season each year so they wouldn’t pick the leaves off the young corn.”

“[D]ozens of persons were awaiting the boat in order to load huge hands of ‘green fig’, plantains and mafoubay, baskets of blue dasheen, ‘renter’ yam, yellow yam, cassava and sweet potatoes, parcels of finely ground farine, bags of wet sugar, cages of ‘yard fowl’, tightly tethered hogs, sheep and goats which would be taken to Trinidad to be bought by the Marketing Board and private traders that would be waiting at the docks in Port-of-Spain.”

“Like an expectant dog barking for his supper, he [Barbados Prime Minister Tom Adams] rushes in to please his new master [Ronald] Reagan like all good yardfowls by attacking Grenada.”

“All Caribbean politicians have a network of supporters and informants, popularly known as ‘yard-fowls’. The VSN [Volontaires de la Sécurité Nationale, or Tonton Macoute] were the yard-fowl armed.”

“The peculiar term "Yardfowl" has been with us for nearly 40 years. Its humble beginnings to present day, this apparently indigenous adjective has gone through its own socioeconomic changes. [...] Meant to convey a derogatory, pejorative connotation, "Yardfowl" was given immortality by our Calypso King the Mighty Gabby, when he produced a musical tribute, some years ago highlighting this unique Barbadian expression.”

“A yardfowl, according to Marjorie's St. Euribian dictionary of standard dialect, is anybody who t'ink dat being able to call de prime minister by he first name is a paycheck. In other words, a total jackass.”

“The loathsome use of "yardfowl" has really never been meant to describe the average member of any political party in Barbados. [...] So "yardfowls" are generally not the people who will attend the party caucuses or the constituency meetings to ask questions and seek answers. Instead, you would expect those so designated, even by leading members of the political parties, to be the leading hecklers of opponents and to be mindlessly singing the praises of those whom they favour. Their refrain: "Talk yuh talk, I wid you all the way." They represent a unique vociferous brand.”

“I was completely paralyzed by the wealth of idiocy on display this week and the complete intellectual impoverishment taking place in this country. Sadly, there is only one article per week and not every yardfowl is worthy of a decent or printable response.”

CEFR level