Definition of "casual"

casual breaks, in the general system

1819 June 23 – 1820 September 13, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], “(please specify the title)”, in The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., New York, N.Y.: […] C. S. Van Winkle, […]

a constant habit, rather than a casual gesture

1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 9, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields

This time was most dreadful for Lilian. Thrown on her own resources and almost penniless, she maintained herself and paid the rent of a wretched room near the hospital by working as a charwoman, sempstress, anything. In a moment she had dropped to the level of a casual labourer.

1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XVII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company

I removed my jacket and threw it casually over the back of the settee.

2007, Nick Holland, The Girl on the Bus, page 117

It was a casual sneer, obviously one of a long line. There was hatred behind it, but of a quiet, chronic type, nothing new or unduly virulent, and he was taken aback by the flicker of amazed incredulity that passed over the younger man's ravaged face.

1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 8, in The China Governess‎

Hogan assumed the entire creek bed was to be played as a casual hazard, moved his ball out and assessed himself a one-stroke penalty.

2012, Jeff Miller, Grown at Glen Garden: Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson, and the Little Texas Golf Course that Propelled Them to Stardom

At 15, he became a casual: one of the label-wearing, wedge-flicking, swaggering hooligan peacock boys who dominated the north-west when I was growing up. Casuals were working-class lads (called Perry boys in Manchester) who loved football, fighting and brilliant sportswear.

2019 September 14, Miranda Sawyer, “Mark Leckey: ‘There has to be a belief that art has this power, this charisma'”, in The Guardian‎

Casuals outnumbered regulars in the art-house audience two to one.

1972, Lee C. Garrison, "The Needs of Motion Picture Audiences", California Management Review, Volume 15, Issue 2, Winter 1972, page 149

Most often, when a series is marketed toward casuals, the loyals feel that their interests and needs are not being met.

2010, Jennifer Gillan, Television and New Media: Must-Click TV, page 16

Treating a gay relationship as a puzzle that must be pursued by the clever viewers and hidden from “casuals” until a narrative reveal at the eleventh hour seems antithetical to the idea of normalized representation that TJLCers claim as the main reason they want Johnlock to be canon, […]

2018, E. J. Nielsen, “The Gay Elephant Meta in the Room: Sherlock and the Johnlock Conspiracy”, in Joseph Brennan, editor, Queerbaiting and Fandom: Teasing Fans Through Homoerotic Possibilities, page 91

I was a boy in 1922 or 1923, when buses first started to run between the village and the town; there were tramps, casuals as they were called; the whole pattern of my boyhood was knit into a very loaded atmosphere of human character.

1983, Reg Butler, Reg Butler, London: Tate Gallery London, page 14

Next spring you’ll see more women than ever wearing “casuals” and “flats,” the shoes with the wedge heels or no heels at all.

1948 December, “Shoes: Competition Is Back”, in Kiplinger Magazine, page 47, column 2

In girls wearing casuals, ugly hypertrophied skin over the heels was frequently noted, probably due to the loose shoe moving as they walked.

1959, The Medical Officer, page 158

Like his friends, he is wearing casuals, ideal for lounging around crypts.

1967, Kenneth Tynan, Tynan Right & Left: Plays, Films, People, Places and Events, New York, N.Y.: Atheneum, page 65

He and I were wearing casuals […]

1984, William Golding, The Paper Men, page 71