- a strong push
- You have to give the door a shove or it won't close.
- Harry gave him a hefty shove and he fell over.
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadjective- friendly
- gentle
- light
- …
- give somebody/something
- with a shove
Word OriginOld English scūfan (verb), of Germanic origin; related to Dutch schuiven and German schieben, also to shuffle.Want to learn more?
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Idioms
See shove in the Oxford Advanced American Dictionarywhen push comes to shove
- (informal) when there is no other choice; when everything else has failedTopics Preferences and decisionsc2, Difficulty and failurec2
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shove