Definition of "jig"

jig¹

/d͡ʒɪɡ/

noun
plural jigs
1. (music) A light, brisk musical movement; a gigue.
2. (traditional Irish music and dance) A lively dance in 6/8 (double jig), 9/8 (slip jig) or 12/8 (single jig) time; a tune suitable for such a dance. By extension, a lively traditional tune in any of these time signatures. Unqualified, the term is usually taken to refer to a double (6/8) jig.
  Quotations
  Soon Marshall is doing an elaborate foot-to-foot jig, and then they're all bounding around. Shoulder dips. Yee-ha faces. It's an impromptu hoedown.
  2012 November 15, Tom Lamont, “How Mumford & Sons became the biggest band in the world”, in The Daily Telegraph‎
3. (traditional English Morris dance) A dance performed by one or sometimes two individual dancers, as opposed to a dance performed by a set or team.
4. (fishing) A type of lure consisting of a hook molded into a weight, usually with a bright or colorful body.
5. A device in manufacturing, woodworking, or other creative endeavors for controlling the location, path of movement, or both of either a workpiece or the tool that is operating upon it. Subsets of this general class include machining jigs, woodworking jigs, welders' jigs, jewelers' jigs, and many others.
  Quotations
  The bodywork employs, where possible, the same constructional methods as for the standard B.R. coaching stock, in order to utilise existing jigs and press tools.
  1959 March, “The 2,500 h.p. electric locomotives for the Kent Coast electrification”, in Trains Illustrated, page 125
6. (mining) An apparatus or machine for jigging ore.
7. (obsolete) A light, humorous piece of writing, especially in rhyme; a farce in verse; a ballad.
  Quotations
  A jig shall be clapped at, and every rhyme / Praised and applauded by a clamorous chime.
  1647, John Fletcher, Beaumont and Fletcher, The Fair Maid of the Inn
8. (obsolete) A trick; a prank.
  Quotations
  This Innovation? Is't not a fine Jigg? / A precious cunning in the late Protector / To shuffle a new Prince into the State.
  1635, James Shirley, The Coronation
verb
third-person singular simple present jigs, present participle jigging, simple past and past participle jigged
1. To move briskly, especially as a dance.
2. To move with a skip or rhythm; to move with vibrations or jerks.
  Quotations
  […] and the fin would jig off slowly, as if it were looking for nothing at all.
  1893, Rudyard Kipling, The White Seal
3. (fishing) To fish with a jig.
4. To sing to the tune of a jig.
  Quotations
  No, my complete master, but to jig off a tune at the tongue’s end, canary to it with your feet, humor it with turning up your eyelids,
  c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act III, scene i]
5. To trick or cheat; to cajole; to delude.
  Quotations
  Make thy moan to ballad singers and rhymers ; they'll jig out thy wretchedness and abominations to new tunes
  1633, Iohn Ford [i.e., John Ford], Loues Sacrifice. A Tragedie […], London: […] I[ohn] B[eale] for Hugh Beeston, […], (please specify the page)
6. (mining) To sort or separate, as ore in a jigger or sieve.
7. To cut or form, as a piece of metal, in a jigging machine.
8. To skip school or be truant (Australia, Canadian Maritimes)

jig²

/d͡ʒɪɡ/

noun
plural jigs
1. (US, offensive, slang, dated, ethnic slur) A black person.
  Quotations
  “You got a new jig, huh?” The boy looked out at Jones through his swirls of oiled hair. “What happened to the last one? He die or something?”
  a. 1969, John Kennedy Toole, A Confederacy of Dunces, Penguin, published 1981
  “…Lucky for me he wasn’t a jig, otherwise I couldn’t have done it.”“Jig?”“Nigger. Afro American.” His voice was heavy with sarcasm.
  2011, Andrew Lithgow, Retribution‎, page 228

Definition of "jig"

jig1

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jig2

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jig¹

jig²