kitchen sink

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English

WOTD – 23 August 2024

Etymology

The noun is derived from kitchen +‎ sink.[1] Sense 2.1 (“miscellaneous item or miscellany”) is probably from everything but the kitchen sink.

The adjective is derived from the noun. Sense 1 (“of or pertaining to a realist style of painting characterized by scenes of dull or untidy domestic interiors of urban working-class people”) was coined by the British art critic David Sylvester (1924–2001) in a December 1954 article entitled “The Kitchen Sink”:[1][2] see the quotation.

The verb is a back-formation from kitchen-sinking (noun), which is derived from the noun.[3]

Pronunciation

Noun

kitchen sink (plural kitchen sinks)

  1. A sink in a kitchen used for washing crockery, cutlery, utensils, food, etc., and disposing of waste.
    The kitchen sink was piled high with dirty dishes.
  2. (figurative)
    2. (also attributive) A miscellaneous item or a miscellany, especially exemplifying an indiscriminate profusion.
      They threw the kitchen sink at the problem, but still couldn’t fix it.
      • 1994, P[atrick] J[ake] O’Rourke, “Fashionable Worries: If Meat is Murder, are Eggs Rape?”, in All the Trouble in the World: The Lighter Side of Famine, Pestilence, Destruction and Death, London: Picador, →ISBN, section III, page 11:
        The April 1994 issue of Washingtonian ran an article by my friend Andrew Ferguson about corporate "multicultural training". Andy quoted one of the trainers (or facilitators, as they like to be called), whose job it is to instill "sensitivity" about age, race, gender, disability, sexual orientation, and the kitchen sink into employees of Washington businesses: […]
      • 1997 March 30, Frederic M. Biddle, “Networks’ wake-up call”, in Boston Sunday Globe (ArtsEtc. section), volume 251, number 89, Boston, Mass.: The Globe Newspaper Co., →ISSN, →OCLC, page N4, columns 4–5:
        The morning shows are now kitchen sinks, sometimes setting the network's news agenda for the day with interviews […] but always repeating bits of the previous night's newscasts, while promoting what's going to air on that night's shows.
      • 2007 November, LeapFrog Enterprises, “Top Toys”, in Caroline Connell, editor, Today’s Parent, volume 24, number 11, Toronto, Ont.: St. Joseph Communications, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 75:
        How good are you at packing a car's trunk? Decide how big a challenge you want, then choose your cards to find out which of the crazy items – everything from a spare tire to the kitchen sink – you need to cram in.
      • 2017 January 31, Nick Patch, “The story of ‘Drinking in L.A.,’ 20 years later”, in Toronto Star‎[1], Toronto, Ont.: Toronto Star Newspapers, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-01-29:
        It's been 20 years since "Drinking in L.A." and Bran Van 3000's eclectic debut Glee dropped back in February 1997, when the group's hip, kitschy, kitchen-sink esthetic and genre-defying mixtape intoxication were so en vogue that even Madonna was drawn into the bidding war.
    3. (metonymically) In chained or tied to the kitchen sink, etc.: domestic chores or housework, especially when regarded as menial and tedious.
    4. (obsolete) A thing regarded as defiled due to corruption, immorality, etc.
      • [1889 January], Rudyard Kipling, “The Education of Otis Yeere. I. Showing How the Great Idea was Born.”, in Under the Deodars (A. H. Wheeler & Co.’s Indian Railway Library; no. 4), Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh: A[rthur] H[enry] Wheeler & Co.; London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, & Rivington, […], →OCLC, page 10:
        Jack used to be a clever man, though I say so who shouldn't. Government has eaten him up. All his ideas and powers of conversation—he really used to be a good talker, even to his wife, in the old days—are taken from him by this—this kitchen-sink of a Government. That's the case with every man up here who is at work.

Derived terms

Translations

domestic chores or housework — see housework

Adjective

kitchen sink (not comparable) (UK)

  2. (painting) Of or pertaining to a mid-20th-century realist style of painting in Britain characterized by scenes of dull or untidy domestic interiors such as kitchens in the homes of urban working-class people; also, of or pertaining to an artist or group of artists painting in this style.
    • 1954 December, David Sylvester, “The Kitchen Sink”, in Stephen Spender, Irving Kristol, editors, Encounter, London: Encounter Ltd., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 62, column 2:
      It is evident that neither objectivity nor abstraction is the aim of the young painters of the kitchen-sink school.
    • 2004 autumn, Adrian Clark, “Two British Art Patrons of the 1940s and 1950s: Sir Colin Anderson and Peter Watson”, in The British Art Journal, volume V, number 2, London: Art Journals, →ISSN, →JSTOR, →OCLC, page 74, column 1:
      [T]here are a number of instances of [John] Berger promoting the four artists known as the Beaux Arts Quartet, or the Kitchen Sink painters—John Bratby, Jack Smith, Edward Middleditch and Derrick Greaves.
    • 2019 May 31, Abi Shapiro, “The Kitchen Sink Too”, in British Art Studies‎[2], number 12, London: Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art; New Haven, Conn.: Yale Center for British Art, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-01-29:
      The home and domesticity were the main subjects of "kitchen sink" painting, a short-lived style of realism active in London between 1952 and 1957. The four artists typically associated with this genre are Jack Smith, Edward Middleditch, Derrick Greaves, and John Bratby. […] In the histories of post-war British art, it remains widely unchallenged that these four men are the only "kitchen sink" artists. Their works from the 1950s are considered as central in discourses of post-war representations of the home and labour, with critics and historians often locating "kitchen sink" painting's legacy as a precursor to British pop art's focus on everyday domestic objects.
  3. (by extension, drama, fiction, film, television, originally derogatory) Of or pertaining to a mid-20th-century (especially 1950s–1960s) genre of drama, fiction, etc., in Britain depicting the harsh lives of working-class people; also, of or pertaining to a film, novel, play, etc., of this genre.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

kitchen sink (third-person singular simple present kitchen sinks, present participle kitchen sinking, simple past and past participle kitchen sinked)

  1. (transitive)
    1. To make (something) overly complicated or elaborate; to overcomplicate, to overwork.
    2. To raise to (someone) unrelated complaints and other matters during an argument.
    3. (business) To release (a large amount of information about the poor financial results of a company) in one go, in the hope that there will be less impact.
  2. (intransitive) To raise unrelated complaints and other matters during an argument.

Translations

to make (something) overly complicated or elaborate — see overcomplicate,‎ overwork

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 “kitchen sink, n. and adj.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, December 2023; “kitchen sink, n.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
  2. ^ David Sylvester (1954 December) “The Kitchen Sink”, in Stephen Spender, Irving Kristol, editors, Encounter, London: Encounter Ltd., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 62, column 1:
    The post-war generation takes us back from the studio to the kitchen. Dead ducks, rabbits and fish—especially skate—can be found there, as in the expressionist slaughterhouse, but only as part of an inventory which includes every kind of food and drink, every kind of utensil and implement, the usual plain furniture, and even the baby’s nappies on the line. Everything but the kitchen sink? The kitchen sink too. The point is that it is a very ordinary kitchen, lived in by a very ordinary family.
  3. ^ “kitchen sink, v.”, in OED Online Paid subscription required⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, July 2023.

Further reading

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