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Crew vs Stuff - What's the difference?

crew | stuff |

In obsolete terms the difference between crew and stuff

is that crew is any company of people; an assemblage; a throng while stuff is refuse or worthless matter; hence, also, foolish or irrational language; nonsense; trash.

In nautical terms the difference between crew and stuff

is that crew is to take on, recruit (new) crew while stuff is a melted mass of turpentine, tallow, etc., with which the masts, sides, and bottom of a ship are smeared for lubrication.

As nouns the difference between crew and stuff

is that crew is a group of people (often staff) manning and operating a large facility or piece of equipment such as a factory, ship, boat, or airplane while stuff is miscellaneous items; things; (with possessive) personal effects.

As verbs the difference between crew and stuff

is that crew is to be a member of a vessel's crew while stuff is to fill by crowding something into; to cram with something; to load to excess.

crew

English

Etymology 1

from (etyl), from (etyl)

Noun

(en noun)
  • A group of people (often staff) manning and operating a large facility or piece of equipment such as a factory, ship, boat, or airplane
  • If you need help, please contact a member of the crew .
    The crews of the two ships got into a fight.
  • A member of the crew of a vessel or plant
  • One crew died in the accident.
  • (obsolete) Any company of people; an assemblage; a throng.
  • * Spenser
  • There a noble crew / Of lords and ladies stood on every side.
  • * Milton
  • Faithful to whom? to thy rebellious crew ?
  • A member of a ship's company who is not an officer
  • The officers and crew assembled on the deck.
    ''There are quarters for three officers and five crew .
  • (arts) The group of workers on a dramatic production who are not part of the cast
  • There are a lot of carpenters in the crew !
    The crews for different movies would all come down to the bar at night.
  • A worker on a dramatic production who is not part of the cast
  • There were three actors and six crew on the set.
  • A group of people working together on a task
  • The crews competed to cut the most timber.
  • A close group of friends
  • I'd look out for that whole crew down at Jack's.
  • A set of individuals lumped together by the speaker
  • * 1861 William Weston Patton, (version of) John Brown's Body
  • He captured Harper’s Ferry, with his nineteen men so few,
    And frightened "Old Virginny" till she trembled thru and thru;
    They hung him for a traitor, they themselves the traitor crew ,
    But his soul is marching on.
  • * {{quote-book, 1950, Bernard Nicholas Schilling, Conservative England and the Case Against Voltaire, page=266 citation
  • , passage=Malignant principles bear fruit in kind and the Revolution did no more than practice what men had been taught by the abandoned crew of philosophers. }}
  • (slang, hip-hop) A hip-hop group
  • * {{quote-book, 2003, Jennifer Guglielmo & Salvatore Salerno, Are Italians White?, page=150 citation
  • , passage=We decided we needed another rapper in the crew and spent months looking.}}
  • (sports, rowing, uncountable) The sport of competitive rowing.
  • * {{quote-book, 1989, & Mary Morgan, Spock on Spock citation
  • , passage=Two Andover classmates, Al Wilson and Al Lindley, both went out for crew in our freshman year at Yale.}}
  • (rowing) A rowing team manning a single shell.
  • * {{quote-book, 1888, , Boating citation
  • , passage=If a crew feather much under water, it is a good plan to seat them in a row on a bench, and give each man a stick to handle as an oar.}} Image:STS-87_crew_1.jpg, Crew of a spaceship Image:Toronto female rowing team.jpg, Crew of a rowing shell Image:ScottKalittaDragsterPits.jpg, Crew working on a race car Image:Daara J.jpg, A hip-hop crew
    Synonyms
    * (group manning a vessel) ship's company, all hands, complement * (member of a crew) crewer, member; nautical only : sailor, seaman * (non-officer ship worker) seaman * (non-cast dramatic personnel) staff, stagehand * (group engaged in a task) team, gang * (social group) clique, gang, pack, crowd, bunch, lot (UK); posse * (group lumped together) crowd, flock, lot, gang * (hip-hop group) posse, band, group
    Derived terms
    * crew cut * crewless * crewman * crew mate * ground crew/groundcrew * motley crew * skeleton crew

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To be a member of a vessel's crew
  • We crewed together on a fishing boat last year.
    The ship was crewed by fifty sailors.
  • To be a member of a work or production crew
  • The film was crewed and directed by students.
  • To supply workers or sailors for a crew
  • * {{quote-book, 2003, Kirk C. Jenkins, The Battle Rages Higher, isbn=0813122813, page=42 citation
  • , passage= Steele crewed the boat with men from his own regiment and volunteers from John Wood's detachment.}}
  • (nautical) To do the proper work of a sailor
  • The crewing of the vessel before the crash was deficient.
  • (nautical) To take on, recruit (new) crew
  • * {{quote-news, 1967, January, , Tampa, The Pilot, page=30 citation
  • , passage=The two ships will be crewing in the latter half of September.}}
    Derived terms
    * crewer * uncrewed * crew up

    Etymology 2

    Verb

    (head)
  • (British) (crow) To have made the characteristic sound of a rooster.
  • It was still dark when the cock crew .

    Etymology 3

    Probably of (etyl) origin.

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (British, dialectal) A pen for livestock such as chickens or pigs
  • * {{quote-book, 2004, , On the Edge, page=7 citation
  • , passage=Between the shippon and the pig-crew , with the wind blowing over from the vegetable ground.}}

    Etymology 4

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • The Manx shearwater.
  • (Webster 1913)

    See also

    * *

    stuff

    English

    (wikipedia stuff)

    Noun

    (en-noun)
  • Miscellaneous items; things; (with possessive) personal effects.
  • :
  • *
  • *:The Bat—they called him the Bat.. He'd never been in stir, the bulls had never mugged him, he didn't run with a mob, he played a lone hand, and fenced his stuff so that even the fence couldn't swear he knew his face.
  • The tangible substance that goes into the makeup of a physical object.
  • *Sir (c.1569-1626)
  • *:The workman on his stuff' his skill doth show, / And yet the ' stuff gives not the man his skill.
  • A material for making clothing; any woven textile, but especially a woollen fabric.
  • *1992 , Hilary Mantel, A Place of Greater Safety , Harper Perennial 2007, p.147:
  • *:She was going out to buy some lengths of good woollen stuff for Louise's winter dresses.
  • Abstract substance or character.
  • *c.1599 , (William Shakespeare),
  • *:When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept; / Ambition should be made of sterner stuff
  • *c.1610 , (William Shakespeare), (The Tempest) ,
  • *:We are such stuff / As dreams are made on
  • (lb)
  • :
  • *{{quote-book, year=1935, author= George Goodchild
  • , title=Death on the Centre Court, chapter=3 , passage=It had been his intention to go to Wimbledon, but as he himself said: “Why be blooming well frizzled when you can hear all the results over the wireless.
  • *{{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-03, volume=408, issue=8847, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= Yesterday’s fuel , passage=The dawn of the oil age was fairly recent. Although the stuff was used to waterproof boats in the Middle East 6,000 years ago, extracting it in earnest began only in 1859 after an oil strike in Pennsylvania. The first barrels of crude fetched $18 (around $450 at today’s prices).}}
  • Substitution for trivial details.
  • :
  • (lb) Narcotic drugs, especially heroin.
  • *1947 , William Burroughs, letter, 11 March:
  • *:For some idiotic reason the bureaucrats are more opposed to tea than to stuff .
  • Furniture; goods; domestic vessels or utensils.
  • *Sir (c.1564-1627)
  • *:He took away locks, and gave away the king's stuff .
  • (lb) A medicine or mixture; a potion.
  • :(Shakespeare)
  • (lb) Refuse or worthless matter; hence, also, foolish or irrational language; nonsense; trash.
  • *(John Dryden) (1631-1700)
  • *:Anger would indite / Such woeful stuff as I or Shadwell write.
  • (lb) A melted mass of turpentine, tallow, etc., with which the masts, sides, and bottom of a ship are smeared for lubrication.
  • :
  • Paper stock ground ready for use. When partly ground, it is called half stuff .
  • :(Knight)
  • Usage notes

    * The textile sense is increasingly specialized and sounds dated in everyday contexts.

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To fill by crowding something into; to cram with something; to load to excess.
  • She stuffed the turkey for Thanksgiving using her secret stuffing recipe.
  • * Dryden
  • Lest the gods, for sin, / Should with a swelling dropsy stuff thy skin.
  • * 1922 , (Margery Williams), (The Velveteen Rabbit)
  • The Rabbit could not claim to be a model of anything, for he didn’t know that real rabbits existed; he thought they were all stuffed with sawdust like himself, and he understood that sawdust was quite out-of-date and should never be mentioned in modern circles.
  • To fill a space with (something) in a compressed manner.
  • He stuffed his clothes into the closet and shut the door.
  • * Francis Bacon
  • Put roses into a glass with a narrow mouth, stuffing them close together and they retain smell and colour.
  • (used in the passive) To sate.
  • I’m stuffed after having eaten all that turkey, mashed potatoes and delicious stuffing.
  • (transitive, British, Australia, New Zealand) To be broken. (rfex)
  • To sexually penetrate. (rfex)
  • To be cut off in a race by having one's projected and committed racing line (trajectory) disturbed by an abrupt manoeuvre by a competitor.
  • I got stuffed by that guy on the supermoto going into that turn, almost causing us to crash.
  • To preserve a dead bird or animal by filling its skin.
  • To obstruct, as any of the organs; to affect with some obstruction in the organs of sense or respiration.
  • * Shakespeare
  • I'm stuffed , cousin; I cannot smell.
  • To form or fashion by packing with the necessary material.
  • * Jonathan Swift
  • An Eastern king put a judge to death for an iniquitous sentence, and ordered his hide to be stuffed into a cushion, and placed upon the tribunal.
  • (dated) To crowd with facts; to cram the mind of; sometimes, to crowd or fill with false or idle tales or fancies.
  • Synonyms

    * (to sexually penetrate) fuck, root, screw

    Derived terms

    * * stuff the ballot box * stuffy

    Derived terms

    * made of sterner stuff * stuff one's face * stuff up * stuff-up * stuff you * stuffed up * get stuffed