gatecrash

Formsgatecrashes, gatecrashing, gatecrashed

1. 1
   verbtransitive or intransitive

   To turn up at a social event that one was not invited to, or to get into one without paying.

   A group of students decided to gatecrash the graduation ball.

   He gatecrashed the gallery opening and helped himself to the free champagne.

   Similarcrash

   Note

   Built from gate and crash, the word pictures someone forcing a way past the entrance instead of being waved through. That is why it covers both the uninvited guest and the one who skips the ticket. It stretches beyond parties to any closed event: Will Potter, writing in 2024, uses it for Matt Walsh's attempt to get into a convention interview. The verb is written solid: gatecrashed, gatecrashing.

2. 2
   noununcountable

   An act of attending a party or event without an invitation or without having paid to get in.

   The gatecrash turned a private celebration into a packed, noisy affair.

   Organizers tightened security after last year's gatecrash.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   In a traditional Chinese wedding, a ritual testing the groom, in which the bridesmaids set him and his groomsmen difficult or embarrassing tasks to prove his love for the bride.

   The gatecrash kept the groom outside for half an hour, bargaining through the door with red envelopes.

   At the gatecrash, the groomsmen ate spoonfuls of bitter melon to prove their loyalty.

   Note

   Asian English has turned the intruder into a guest of honor. Here the groom is expected, and the barrier at the bride's house is staged so he can earn his way through. Singapore papers such as The Straits Times write of the gatecrashing ceremony or a wedding gatecrash, with dares like forming a human pyramid or dancing to Britney Spears' Toxic. Unlike the uninvited arrival, everyone is in on it.

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