shack

Etymology 1

Unknown. Some authorities derive this word from Mexican Spanish jacal, from Nahuatl xacalli (“adobe hut”). Alternatively, the word may instead come from ramshackle/ramshackly (e.g., old ramshackly house) or perhaps it may be a back-formation from shackly.

noun

1. A crude, roughly built hut or cabin.
   The men resided in a huge bunk house, which consisted of one room only, with a shack outside where the cooking was done. In the large room were a dozen bunks ; half of them in a very dishevelled state, […] 1913, Robert Barr, chapter 6, in Lord Stranleigh Abroad
2. Any poorly constructed or poorly furnished building.
   The stations are generally very poor, even for a branch line; some are mere wooden shacks, and Moniaive itself is one of the least prepossessing terminal stations I have ever seen. 1944 January and February, E. R. McCarter, “The Cairn Valley Light Railway”, in Railway Magazine, page 48
3. (slang) The room from which a ham radio operator transmits.

verb

1. To live (in or with); to shack up.

Etymology 2

Obsolete variant of shake. Compare Scots shag (“refuse of barley or oats”).

noun

1. (obsolete) Grain fallen to the ground and left after harvest.
2. (obsolete) Nuts which have fallen to the ground.
3. (obsolete) Freedom to pasturage in order to feed upon shack.
   […] first comes the case of tenants with a customary right to shack their sheep and cattle who have overburdened the fields with a larger number of beasts than their tenement entitles them to, or who have allowed their beasts to feed in the field out of shack time. 1918, Christobel Mary Hoare Hood, The History of an East Anglian Soke http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&hl=en&vid=OCLC11859773&id=rI0iE-yqyAMC&q=%22right+to+shack%22&prev=http://books.google.com/books%3Flr%3D%26q%3D%2522right%2Bto%2Bshack%2522&pgis=1
   1996, J M Neeson, Commoners http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&hl=en&vid=ISBN0521567742&id=2CqhjjiwLtEC&pg=PA76&lpg=PA76&sig=3geUREguU3vTYj_05PtAfzFODDA The fields were enclosed by Act in 1791, and Tharp gave the cottagers about thirteen acres for their right of shack.
4. (UK, US, dialect, obsolete) A shiftless fellow; a low, itinerant beggar; a vagabond; a tramp.
   Some peple hev a fakilty two get along into the world, whilst others air poor shacks & good for nothing. 1866, Betsey Jane Ward, Book of Goaks
   All the poor old shacks about the town found a friend in Deacon Marble. 1868, Henry Ward Beecher, Norwood, or Village Life in New England
5. (fishing) Bait that can be picked up at sea.
6. (Nigeria, slang) A drink, especially an alcoholic one.

verb

1. (obsolete) To shed or fall, as corn or grain at harvest.
2. (obsolete) To feed in stubble, or upon waste.
   They [turkeys] are then sold‥to the larger farmers to ‘shack’ upon the barley or oat stubbles. 1867, “Journal of the Royal Agriculatural Socirty”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name)
   […] first comes the case of tenants with a customary right to shack their sheep and cattle who have overburdened the fields with a larger number of beasts than their tenement entitles them to, or who have allowed their beasts to feed in the field out of shack time. 1918, Christobel Mary Hoare Hood, The History of an East Anglian Soke http://books.google.com/books?ie=UTF-8&hl=en&vid=OCLC11859773&id=rI0iE-yqyAMC&q=%22right+to+shack%22&prev=http://books.google.com/books%3Flr%3D%26q%3D%2522right%2Bto%2Bshack%2522&pgis=1
3. (UK, dialect) To wander as a vagabond or tramp.
4. (US, intransitive) To hibernate; to go into winter quarters.
5. (Nigeria, slang) To drink, especially alcohol.

Etymology 3

From shagged or shagged out, British colloquialisms.

adj

1. (Singapore, slang) Exhausted, worn out, extremely tired.
   I suppose they could not really blame us for feeling so shack after doing PT, drill and other boring lessons in the morning. 1994, C. S. Cheong, NS: An Air-Level Story, page 33