How to Use gawky in a Sentence

gawky

adjective
  • Yet her body — later seen naked — is a child's, thin and gawky.
    — Kristin McMurran, Peoplemag, 31 May 2024
  • But now, in adulthood, those former gawky adolescents are getting the last laugh.
    — Laura Neilson, WSJ, 14 Dec. 2023
  • This is sort of out there, but Luke Falk is kinda skinny, a bit of a gawky athlete.
    — Tim Rohan, SI.com, 23 Feb. 2018
  • London wasn’t quite swinging yet, and British rock was barely emerging from its gawky teen phase.
    — Elizabeth Winder, Rolling Stone, 24 July 2023
  • The moment for raabs—these gawky, uncoiffed survivors of our soul-leaching winters—is short.
    — Jonathan Kauffman, Bon Appétit, 13 Apr. 2022
  • Like the scrawny, sixth-round pick out of Michigan, with the gawky 40-yard dash and the chip on his shoulder.
    — Ryan Kartje, Orange County Register, 6 Feb. 2017
  • My favorite person on the show was Maria, who sparked gawky-sweet chemistry with Vinny.
    — Darren Franich, EW.com, 28 June 2019
  • Bulsara was desperate to transform himself in that mold, to erase his recent past as a gawky, shy, bucktoothed kid .
    — Brian Hiatt, Rolling Stone, 24 Sep. 2025
  • Anna is blonde and tall and gawky, with braces; Maya is shorter, with a bowl cut forced on her by her mother, and a retainer.
    — Naomi Fry, The New Yorker, 28 Sep. 2020
  • Other times, the tower seems more like a gawky, gentle giant, awkwardly standing on the edge of a group photo.
    — Patrick Kingsley Amit Elkayam, New York Times, 9 Oct. 2022
  • As Plumb, Pappas is awkward but likable in the lead role, and her gawky charm works well with the film’s quirky approach to its story.
    — Kimber Myers, latimes.com, 11 May 2017
  • How else to explain the intimate, gawky tenderness with which the heads of the dead Christ and the man supporting him touch, almost in a kiss?
    — Holland Cotter, New York Times, 12 Oct. 2017
  • Here, Finnigan is gawky and eager in a T-shirt and jeans, with a few helpful props on hand, determined to tick all the boxes just so.
    — Jackson McHenry, Vulture, 10 Oct. 2024
  • His 6-foot-6 height, which affords him a better view of where the ball must go, would be a detriment if Herbert were gawky and ponderous.
    — Tom Krasovic, San Diego Union-Tribune, 12 Sep. 2021
  • Comparisons were made to Barack Obama, on the basis that the two men both had a certain gawky charm and both appeared to inspire an enormous amount of hope.
    — The Economist, 5 Oct. 2017
  • Eva Löbau plays a gawky 27-year-old teacher who arrives at a new job ready to show off her progressive pedagogical methods.
    — Ben Kenigsberg, New York Times, 26 Jan. 2017
  • Even the most lighthearted TikToks reflected a disgust in men who appear awkward, gawky, or fragile.
    — Kitty Ruskin, TIME, 5 Aug. 2024
  • Puberty and the ‘gawky brain’ In the film, Riley is 13-years-old, still playing hockey, and preparing for high school.
    — Laura Baisas, Popular Science, 12 June 2024
  • The young lady, a gawky girl of 13, was a distant cousin whose father had recently become King Emperor.
    — Lily Rothman, Time, 9 Apr. 2021
  • When a gawky teen restores a 1958 Plymouth Fury, the car takes on a life of its own and begins terrorizing those in its way.
    — Ed Stockly, Los Angeles Times, 9 Apr. 2021
  • For motorists travelling north on I-93, 50 Prospect looms in the distance like an overly tall, gawky teenager.
    — James McCown, BostonGlobe.com, 3 Aug. 2023
  • Think Smokey Robinson’s songwriting prowess, and the evolution of the Supremes from gawky teenagers to hit-making divas.
    — Mara Reinstein, Billboard, 23 Aug. 2019
  • The play is narrated by the novel’s three youngest characters, who are all played with childlike humor, guilelessness and gawky physicality.
    — Pam Kragen, San Diego Union-Tribune, 1 Dec. 2022
  • While most women aren’t used to wearing big, sometimes gawky hats, the majority of Derby-goers are sporting some type of head accessory at the track.
    — Taylor M. Riley, The Courier-Journal, 12 Apr. 2018
  • All the money her father had left them was put toward his daughters’ private education, but she was ostracized by wealthy classmates who bullied her for being too poor, too gawky and too dark-skinned.
    — Kyle Buchanan, New York Times, 2 Jan. 2025
  • Played in full, Silent Way induces a pervasive nausea, reveling in gawky soundscapes that seem barely able to contain their outsized, clashing ideas.
    — Maxie Younger, Pitchfork, 27 Mar. 2026
  • Here, teenagers feel like real gawky young adults, instead of the polished twenty-somethings who far exceed the attractiveness of real high schoolers in all their pubescent, hormonal glory.
    — Maureen Lee Lenker, EW.com, 1 May 2020
  • The Sims has a slapstick sense of humor fit for gawky teen years; a Sim can get dumped in the hallway, strike a T-pose for a viral challenge, and then slink away for class in the span of a minute.
    — Wired, 16 July 2022
  • The question remains whether researchers can wrangle their gawky teenage NISQ machines into doing something useful.
    — Tom Simonite Sophia Chen, WIRED, 22 Feb. 2023
  • Crenshaw made fun of Davidson’s gawky stature and then called for respect for all veterans as well as first responders in the 9/11 attacks — one of whom was Davidson’s father.
    — Brian Steinberg, Variety, 19 Sep. 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'gawky.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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