Spunk is cheeky nerve and fight in somebody small or timid. Show some spunk, full of spunk, she has spunk.
In American English it is warm praise, usually for a child or an underdog. Be careful in Britain and Australia, where the word is also crude slang for semen and the admiring sense is largely dead — the same sentence can land very differently.
1nounspunkCheeky nerve and fight in somebody small or timid.
“The little girl showed real spunk when she stood up to the school bully.”
spunk is a spirit.
From 1530, probably a blend of spark and funk, an old word for touchwood or a spark.
Proto-Indo-European
*(s)peng- — to shine
Proto-Germanic
*funkô — spark
Proto-West Germanic
*funkō
Old English
*funca — spark
Middle English
funke
English, today
spunk
Built from
1530, spark and funk. funk (“spark, touchwood”) is from Middle English funke, fonke (“spark”), from Old English funca (“spark”), from Proto-West Germanic funkō, from Proto-Germanic funkô (“spark”), from Proto-Indo-European (s)peng- (“to shine”), and is akin to Middle Low German funke, fanke (“spark”), Middle Dutch vonke (“spark”), Old High German funcho, funko (“spark”), German Funke (“spark”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA