as in slighting
intended to make a person or thing seem of little importance or value
he typically followed up any mention of his accomplishments with some deprecatory comments about his perceived failures
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Recent Examples of deprecatory
This subsided with unusual speed, however, as cricket fans took instead to sharing the self-deprecatory jokes coming over the border.
—
The Economist, 22 June 2019
Philipps has acquired her 1-million-and-growing Instagram followers through her self-deprecatory humor, raw honesty and vulnerability.
—Sonja Haller, USA TODAY, 11 July 2018
What the show is really selling is the Chang attitude and mystique, a combination of ego, exactitude, foul-mouthed rebelliousness and self-deprecatory nerdiness.
—Mike Hale, New York Times, 23 Feb. 2018
The Economist, 22 June 2019
Philipps has acquired her 1-million-and-growing Instagram followers through her self-deprecatory humor, raw honesty and vulnerability.
—Sonja Haller, USA TODAY, 11 July 2018
What the show is really selling is the Chang attitude and mystique, a combination of ego, exactitude, foul-mouthed rebelliousness and self-deprecatory nerdiness.
—Mike Hale, New York Times, 23 Feb. 2018
Recent Examples of Synonyms for deprecatory
Adjective
-
Stuck a feather in his cap and called it macaroni is insulting because a macaroni was a pejorative term used to describe a fashionable man with feminine traits of 18th-century Britain.—
Kurt Snibbe,
Oc Register,
2 July 2025
-
Conversations revealed an ongoing dialogue that was not only deeply insulting to Read, but morally offensive to women broadly.—
Gemma Allen,
Forbes.com,
25 June 2025
Adjective
-
That post used a derogatory term that historically originated as an insult against Chinese people but is often used more generally toward East Asians.—
Doha Madani,
NBC news,
10 July 2025
-
More: Officials rename 28 places in Wisconsin that had names derogatory to Indigenous women.—
Frank Vaisvilas,
jsonline.com,
9 July 2025
Adjective
-
Stuck a feather in his cap and called it macaroni is insulting because a macaroni was a pejorative term used to describe a fashionable man with feminine traits of 18th-century Britain.—
Kurt Snibbe,
Oc Register,
2 July 2025
-
Wife guy, always a little mocking, curdled into the plainly pejorative.—
Jeremy Gordon,
The Atlantic,
9 June 2025
Adjective
-
Deepfakes have been growing more sophisticated in recent years, in addition to being increasingly deployed for malicious purposes.—
Shannon Bond,
NPR,
10 July 2025
-
The best way to safeguard yourself from malicious links that install malware, potentially accessing your private information, is to have antivirus software installed on all your devices.—
Kurt Knutsson,
FOXNews.com,
10 July 2025
Adjective
-
Though the pollen gunk will pass, he's concerned by a contingent of Twitter trolls who've shared uncomplimentary reviews of his recent North American tour.—
Jordan Runtagh,
PEOPLE.com,
21 Jan. 2022
-
Neither party admitted to liability and each agreed to refrain from making disparaging, negative or uncomplimentary statements about the other, the document said.—
Lorraine Mirabella,
Baltimore Sun,
29 July 2022
Adjective
-
The cast gets a huge boost at midseason with the arrival of John Leguizamo, equally broadly funny and vulnerable as Dave’s disgraced former partner, and Anna Chlumsky, hilariously scornful as a law enforcement outsider who gets brought into the story’s chaos.—
Daniel Fienberg,
HollywoodReporter,
26 June 2025
-
The advisee may present herself as a supplicant but end up an aggressor, demanding and scornful.—
Merve Emre,
New Yorker,
16 June 2025
Adjective
-
By contrast, there’s something almost nakedly contemptuous about the end of this season.—
Kathryn VanArendonk,
Vulture,
30 May 2025
-
That’s fine by an administration that seems basically contemptuous of the very concept of due process.—
New York Daily News Editorial Board,
New York Daily News,
31 May 2025
Adjective
-
Trump has even been disdainful or dismissive of the United States’ traditional allies, such as Mexico and Argentina.—
Christopher Sabatini,
Foreign Affairs,
8 Nov. 2017
-
Wise minds inside the Trump administration will hopefully choose to drop a suit first introduced during by a Biden administration reflexively disdainful of big.—
John Tamny,
Forbes.com,
10 Apr. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Deprecatory.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/deprecatory. Accessed 18 Jul. 2025.
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