/ hʌntʃ; NAmE / verb , noun
■ verb
to bend the top part of your body forward and raise your shoulders and back :
[ v ]
She leaned forward, hunching over the desk.
[ vn ]
He hunched his shoulders and thrust his hands deep into his pockets.
► hunched adjective :
a hunched figure
He sat hunched over his breakfast.
■ noun
a feeling that sth is true even though you do not have any evidence to prove it :
It seemed that the doctor's hunch had been right.
I had a hunch (that) you'd be back.
to follow / back your hunches
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WORD ORIGIN
late 15th cent.: of unknown origin. The original meaning was push, shove (noun and verb), a sense retained now in Scots as a noun, and in US dialect as a verb. This sense of the noun probably derives from a US sense of the verb nudge someone in order to draw attention to something .