gulag Hear it!

gulag definition

gu·lag (go̵̅o̅′läg′, -lag′)

noun

  1. the system of prisons and labor camps, esp. for political prisoners, in the Soviet Union: with the
  2. such a prison or forced-labor camp, as in the Soviet Union
  3. any place or situation regarded as like such a prison

Etymology: < Russ acronym for G(lavnoe) u(pravlenie ispravitel'no-trudovykh) lag(erei), Chief Administration of Corrective Labor Camps: term popularized by The Gulag Archipelago by A. Aleksandr (Isayevich) Solzhenitsyn

Webster's New World College Dictionary Copyright © 2009 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Cleveland, Ohio.
Used by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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