English

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Two metal garbage cans

Noun

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garbage can (plural garbage cans)

  1. (Canada, US) A receptacle, usually roughly cylindrical and wider at the top than at the bottom, which serves as a place to discard waste materials.

Usage notes

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The phrase originally referred to large metal containers (typically in the shape of a can), but is now used interchangeably with other names of receptacles for waste materials.

Hyponyms

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Coordinate terms

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Translations

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Further reading

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