Repress Meaning
/ɹəˈpɹɛs/Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
verbTo forcefully prevent an upheaval from developing further.
verbTo check; to keep back.
Sentence Examples
We repress the fact that we eat animals rather than barcoded containers from the supermarket.
Don't repress your emotions.
He tried to to repress his anger during the meeting.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The dictator used military force to ____ any political opposition in the country.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The authoritarian government sought to ____ any form of political dissent through censorship and intimidation.
Word Origin & History
Ultimately from Latin repressus, the perfect passive participle of reprimō (“to repress”).
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Deſire of wine and all delicious drinks […] Thou couldſt repreſs,"
— 1671, John Milton, “The Second Book”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC, page 37, lines 542–544:
"It had been a fraught car journey. From it my abiding memory is Charlie Troy having a deep but short-lived relationship with a smoking cigarette, rummaging after in the depthless depth of a shiny black handbag for a forbidden lipstick, finding it, applying it in Heaney’s mirror with a magician’s dexterity that defied the inconsistencies of the road, pressing, unpressing, and repressing her lips until the look came to her satisfaction and the bow was drawn."
— 2019, Niall Williams, This is Happiness, Bloomsbury (2020), pages 300-301:
"Save for the shows he actually taped — Dylan, Springsteen, Page & Plant and other kindred spirits — his own titles by 1994 were just represses of hard-to-find Japanese or American titles."
— 2010, Clinton Heylin, Bootleg! The Rise And Fall Of The Secret Recording Industry:
Explore More C1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
The dictator used military force to ____ any political opposition in the country.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The authoritarian government sought to ____ any form of political dissent through censorship and intimidation.