Adjacent Words

demeaning definitions

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WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: causing awareness of your shortcomings; "golf is a humbling game" [syn: demeaning, humbling, humiliating, mortifying]

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Demean De*mean", v. t. [imp. & p. p. Demeaned; p. pr. & vb. n. Demeaning.] [OF. demener to conduct, guide, manage, F. se d['e]mener to struggle; pref. d['e]- (L. de) + mener to lead, drive, carry on, conduct, fr. L. minare to drive animals by threatening cries, fr. minari to threaten. See Menace.] 1. To manage; to conduct; to treat. [Our] clergy have with violence demeaned the matter. --Milton. 2. To conduct; to behave; to comport; -- followed by the reflexive pronoun. They have demeaned themselves Like men born to renown by life or death. --Shak. They answered . . . that they should demean themselves according to their instructions. --Clarendon.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

Something that is demeaning makes people have less respect for the person who is treated in that way, or who does that thing. ...demeaning sexist comments... = degrading ADJ: oft ADJ to n

Moby Thesaurus

beneath one, cheap, common, debasing, degrading, deplorable, disadvantaged, disgraceful, gutter, humble, humiliating, humiliative, in the shade, inferior, infra dig, infra indignitatem, junior, less, lesser, low, lower, lowly, minor, modest, opprobrious, ordinary, outrageous, pitiful, sad, scandalous, second rank, second string, secondary, servile, shameful, shocking, sorry, sub, subaltern, subject, subordinate, subservient, third rank, third string, too bad, unbecoming, underprivileged, unworthy of one, vulgar