This word is acceptable for play in the US & UK dictionaries that are being used in the following games:

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n. Water held or pushed back by or as if by a dam or current.

n. A body of water thus formed.

n. A place or situation regarded as isolated, stagnant, or backward: "The running of family fortunes has always been a backwater—albeit a lucrative one—of the investment management business” ( Business Week).

n. A rowing or paddling stroke in which the oar or paddle is pushed forward, used to check a boat's forward motion or move it backward.

n. The water held back by a dam or other obstruction

n. A remote place; somewhere that remains unaffected by new events, progresses, ideas, etc.

n. A rowing stroke in which the oar is pushed forward to stop the boat; see back water

v. To row or paddle a backwater stroke.

v. To vacillate on a long-held position.

n. Water turned back in its course by an obstruction, an opposing current, or the flow of the tide, as in a sewer or river channel, or across a river bar.

n. An accumulation of water overflowing the low lands, caused by an obstruction.

n. Water thrown back by the turning of a waterwheel, or by the paddle wheels of a steamer.

n. 1. Water flowing in from behind.

n. Water thrown back by the turning of a water-wheel or the paddles of steamboats, etc.

n. Water held or forced back, as in a mill-race or in a tributary stream, in consequence of some obstruction, as a dam or flood.

n. An artificial accumulation of water obtained at high tide and reserved in reservoirs, to be discharged at low tide for clearing off deposits in channel-beds and tideways.

n. A creek or arm of the sea which runs parallel to the coast, having only a narrow slip of land between it and the sea, and communicating with the latter by barred entrances.

n. a body of water that was created by a flood or tide or by being held or forced back by a dam

n. a place or condition in which no development or progress is occurring

"Engineers expected the earthen levees at Krotz Springs to hold but are concerned about what they call backwater—water could travel farther south, then spread out and double back over lowlands, inundating about 240 homes here in the coming days."

backwaters   

water    body of water    region   

remote place    jerkwater town    one-horse town    Podunk   

mollusks    dead-fish    water    pest-hole    aphasiology