From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishgulaggu‧lag /ˈɡuːlæɡ $ -lɑːɡ/ noun [countable] SCJone of a group of prison camps in the former USSR, where conditions were very bad
Examples from the Corpus
gulag• As in all gulags, the prisoners have no voice.• If you have assembled a no-name dinner, you are immediately consigned to the gastronomic gulag.• Finally, you arrive in the paint scraper aisle, a dimly lit gulag in the rear of the store.• It is all a bit unnerving, and feels like some secret gulag.• Meaning they either threw you in the gulag for 20 years or condemned you to a lifetime of borscht.Origin gulag (1900-2000) Russian Glavnoe Upravlenie Ispravitel'no-trudovykh Lagerei “Chief Directorate of Labor Camps” 