Pukers

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Individuals who vomit or regurgitate contents from the stomach; people who express strong disgust or revulsion; slang term referring to those who frequently or easily become ill
2. Persons characterized by the act of expelling stomach contents as a reflex; those showing intense repugnance or aversion; informal label for people prone to nausea or throwing up
3. Characters defined by their tendency to vomit; individuals displaying extreme dislike or loathing; colloquial expression for frequent or habitual vomiting persons

Etymology: The word is a plain formation: "puker" is "puke" with the agent suffix "-er", meaning one who pukes, and "pukers" is simply its plural. The verb "puke" is the base, so the interesting part lies in the suffix rather than in any surprising shift of meaning. The suffix has a long ancestry. It descends from a Proto-Italic form, passed through Latin "-arius", which denoted a person connected with a trade or activity. That Latin ending entered Old French as "-ier", and Middle English took it in as "-er". Old English already had a native cognate, "-ere", so English speakers were familiar with this ending long before the French influence arrived. Attaching it to a verb to name a person who performs that action is one of the most productive habits in the language.

Synonyms: vomiters, retchers, barfers