Gun Lingo for the Non-Enthusiast (With a Soundtrack!)

If you’re a gun enthusiast, I highly recommend you read something else—perhaps this article about Twenty One Pilots (although there’s more from them below). This short and incomplete glossary is designed solely to help you understand the news, because as an American, I’m pretty sure that gun lingo will be, you know, in the news. To maximize learning, I will not go in alphabetical order. (Thanks goes to this great article from Lifehacker for helping out.)

 

Firearm

Definitions can vary by country, but in general, this refers to any weapon that uses gunpowder as a propellant in order to expel a projectile. You can get away with saying gun instead as long as you remember that guns which expel projectiles but don’t use gunpowder aren’t technically firearms.

 

Barrel

The “tube” that a projectile moves through prior to exiting a firearm. The inside of the barrel is called the bore, with bore diameter being an important measurement (see caliber below).

 

Cartridge

The basic unit of ammunition (ammo). It consists of gunpowder, a primer, and a projectile (e.g. a bullet), all enclosed in a casing. The term is often used interchangeably with round. A cartridge without a bullet is called a blank.

 

Round

See cartridge.

 

Headstamp

The markings (numbers, letters, and symbols) on the bottom of a cartridge case that identify where it was made.

 

Bullet

As above, a possible projectile in a cartridge. When the primer is struck, gunpowder is ignited, and the bullet is propelled down the barrel at a very high speed. As Foster The People indicates in this song, outrunning a bullet is difficult.

 

 

Shell

A slang word in gun lingo for the leftover casing after a round has been fired. This should not be confused with shotshell, which refers to a cartridge designed to be fired from a shotgun (see below).

 

Rifle

A firearm with a long barrel that is fired from the shoulder and often used for precision shooting. The bore has helical grooves—in other words, it has undergone rifling. You might hear the term long gun in reference to a rifle.

 

Shotgun

Another type of long gun (without rifling) that fires groups of small pellets or a large slug (in lieu of a bullet), ideal for hunters targeting fast-moving and/or large prey. A sawed-off shotgun refers to one whose barrel has been intentionally shortened, making the weapon easier to maneuver and conceal.

 

Handgun

This one is probably self-explanatory and can be used interchangeably with pistol. A revolver is a type of handgun with a cylindrical chamber that holds the cartridges and rotates with each trigger pull (think classic Western movie). I believe that’s what Rage Against The Machine is singing about here.

 

 

Caliber

The bore diameter of a firearm (typically a rifle or handgun), expressed in either inches (.22 caliber means 0.22 inches) or millimeters (in which case the word caliber gets dropped—think 9 mm). Obviously, the ammunition used in the firearm will need to match this measurement.

 

Gauge

A measure related to the bore diameter of a shotgun, quantifying the same concept as caliber, just in a different way. It refers to the number of round lead balls with the same diameter as the bore required to reach a total weight of one pound. As such, the larger the bore, the smaller the gauge!

 

Clip

A device that holds multiple cartridges together. This can then be inserted into a magazine (see below), obviating the need to load the magazine one cartridge at a time.

 

Magazine

The refillable container that feeds cartridges to a firearm.

 

Capacity

The number of cartridges (rounds) that a magazine can hold. What exactly constitutes a high-capacity magazine is up for debate, though more than 10 is getting up there.

 

Semi-automatic

Any firearm that is self-loading. Stated another way, after one cartridge is fired, the next one loads on its own without any sort of intervention. What this means is that you can simply pull the trigger repeatedly to rapidly empty an entire magazine. Here’s a Twenty One Pilots song (that uses gun lingo but has nothing to do with guns) to help you remember.

 

 

Automatic

Any firearm that takes the above concept one step further. In this case, simply holding down the trigger (as opposed to having to pull it for each shot) quickly empties the magazine. A related term is machine gun, inspiration for this track by Jimi Hendrix, in which the guitar and drums recreate the sound you might hear as the weapon is fired.

 

 

Bump stock

A device that can be added to a semi-automatic firearm to allow it to shoot more than one round with each trigger pull, bringing it closer to being an automatic firearm.

 

Suppressor

A device attached to the end of a gun’s barrel to reduce or otherwise alter the sound of its discharge. A slang word for this is silencer.

 

Safety

A mechanism on a firearm that prevents the trigger from being pulled, deployed when firing the weapon is not desired. I couldn’t resist—this Twenty One Pilots tune called “Guns for Hands” references the safety.

 

 

AK-47

AK is short for Avtomat Kalashnikova (Russian for Automatic Kalashnikov)—as in Mikhail Kalashnikov, the Soviet inventor who developed the firearm—and 47 refers to 1947, the year the prototype was designed. The AK-47 remains a hugely popular automatic rifle used by military entities worldwide.

 

AR-15

This stands for ArmaLite Rifle-15—with ArmaLite being the name of a specific gun manufacturer—and refers to a type of lightweight, semi-automatic rifle. Many AR-15-style rifles now exist, often getting press when used in mass shootings. (Note the word assault is nowhere to be found here.)

 

Assault rifle

A specific type of rifle typically used by the military or police that fires cartridges at a specific power and can be used in either semi-automatic or automatic mode. Based on this definition, the aforementioned AR-15-style rifles are not assault rifles (although they are still very effective at ending human life).

 

Assault weapon

Perhaps the most nebulous term of them all, often used in political debates, though with no standard meaning. Various states and other organizations have created their own definitions, but they don’t always align.

 

The bottom line—gun lingo is kind of confusing. Feel free to note any additions, corrections, or soundtrack suggestions in the comments below.