Raw

[raw] /rɔ/

adjective, rawer, rawest.
1.
uncooked, as articles of food:
a raw carrot.
2.
not having undergone processes of preparing, dressing, finishing, refining, or manufacture:
raw cotton.
3.
unnaturally or painfully exposed, as flesh, by removal of the skin or natural integument.
4.
painfully open, as a sore or wound.
5.
crude in quality or character; not tempered or refined by art or taste:
raw humor.
6.
ignorant, inexperienced, or untrained:
a raw recruit.
7.
brutally or grossly frank:
a raw portrayal of human passions.
8.
brutally harsh or unfair:
a raw deal; receiving raw treatment from his friends.
9.
disagreeably damp and chilly, as the weather or air:
a raw, foggy day at the beach.
10.
not diluted, as alcoholic spirits:
raw whiskey.
11.
unprocessed or unevaluated:
raw data.
noun
12.
a sore or irritated place, as on the flesh.
13.
unrefined sugar, oil, etc.
Idioms
14.
in the raw,

/rɔː/
adjective
1.
(of food) not cooked: raw onion
2.
(prenominal) in an unfinished, natural, or unrefined state; not treated by manufacturing or other processes: raw materials for making steel, raw brick
3.
(of an edge of material) unhemmed; liable to fray
4.
(of the skin, a wound, etc) having the surface exposed or abraded, esp painfully
5.
ignorant, inexperienced, or immature: a raw recruit
6.
(prenominal) not selected or modified: raw statistics
7.
frank or realistic: a raw picture of the breakdown of a marriage
8.
(of spirits) undiluted
9.
(mainly US) coarse, vulgar, or obscene
10.
(mainly US) recently done; fresh: raw paintwork
11.
(of the weather) harshly cold and damp
12.
(informal) unfair; unjust (esp in the phrase a raw deal)
noun
13.
(Brit, informal) the raw, a sensitive point: his criticism touched me on the raw
14.
in the raw

adj.

Old English hreaw “uncooked, raw,” from Proto-Germanic *khrawaz (cf. Old Norse hrar, Danish raa, Old Saxon hra, Middle Dutch rau, Dutch rauw, Old High German hrawer, German roh), from PIE root *kreue- (1) “raw flesh” (cf. Sanskrit kravih “raw flesh,” krura- “bloody, raw, hard;” Greek kreas “flesh;” Latin crudus “not cooked,” cruor “thick blood;” Old Irish cru, Lithuanian kraujas, Old Church Slavonic kruvi “blood;” Old English hrot “thick fluid, serum”).

Meaning “tender, sore” is from late 14c.; of persons, “inexperienced” from 1560s; of weather, “damp and chilly” first recorded 1540s. Related: Rawly; rawness. Raw material is from 1796, with sense of “in a rudimental condition, unfinished.” Phrase in the raw “naked” (1921) is from the raw “exposed flesh,” attested from 1823. Raw deal “harsh treatment” attested by 1893.

raw (rô)
adj. raw·er, raw·est

adjective

In addition to the idiom beginning with raw