What specific emotion would best describe dukkah? One of my key problems studying Buddhism has been definitions. My definition often doesn't have the same span as that of the typical Buddhist - but I am usually successful in coming to similar conclusions. I try to focus on some generalities of the word in question and get an emotional feel.

Which brings me to the problem with dukkah. I am not sure what word(s) properly conveys (in english) the emotion sought to be elicited by the concept of dukkah. And the terms we HAVE come to use in its' description to date are rather, uh, dukkah.

I see it as frustration. You keep trying to satisfy a permanent hunger with an impermanent response. But I am told that is also not a complete comparison. 

For example ... seething in anger borne from frustration is a different type of anger than that coming from a reaction to an insult. Or is it? Was it a generalized word they flippantly threw around? Or did it intend to evoke a specific type of emotional response?
There's a statement here (I'm guessing by Bhikkhu Bodhi) that it has no single best translation:


  No single English word adequately captures the full depth, range, and subtlety of the crucial Pali term dukkha. Over the years, many translations of the word have been used ("stress," "unsatisfactoriness," "suffering," etc.). Each has its own merits in a given context. There is value in not letting oneself get too comfortable with any one particular translation of the word, since the entire thrust of Buddhist practice is the broadening and deepening of one's understanding of dukkha until its roots are finally exposed and eradicated once and for all. One helpful rule of thumb: as soon as you think you've found the single best translation for the word, think again: for no matter how you describe dukkha, it's always deeper, subtler, and more unsatisfactory than that.


Its saying "in a given context" implies to me that the word is applicable to multiple contexts, in which multiple different emotions are manifest.

Some of these emotions include grief (when loved ones dies), fear (of losing what you value), anger, denial, and so on.

Since you're asking about emotion, perhaps consider the so-called "afflictive emotions": a.k.a. the Kleshas. Different schools have slightly different ways to enumerate the Kleshas. I note that the "grief" and "fear" that I mentioned aren't listed but "attachment" is. I think that shows your question is difficult to answer i.e. what one person sees as grief another person sees as (or names it to be) attachment.

The quote above says that dukkha is "deeper and subtler" than any definition you can think of. For what it's worth the shallowest definition I can think of (the highest-level, most single-meaninged definition) is that it's the opposite of sukha. I think that's inaccurate though, to the extent that a lay person would see sukha as a or the worthwhile goal, whereas nirvana is the ideal for a monk.

The four noble truths associated it with tanha, so perhaps the single-emotion you're looking for is "unsatisfied desire" or even "unsatisfiable desire", or just "dissatisfaction".

So "multiple contexts", or perhaps even all contexts: it's canonically associated with all saṅkhārās.