Ridicule Meaning
/ˈɹɪdɪkjuːl/Definition, CEFR level C2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
verbTo criticize or disapprove of someone or something through scornful jocularity; to make fun of.
nounDerision; mocking or humiliating words or behavior.
Sentence Examples
If you do that, you're going to subject yourself to ridicule.
It is not good to ridicule him in public.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The new student faced constant ____ from his classmates for his accent.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The comedian used gentle ____ to expose the absurdity of the government's latest policy announcement.
Word Origin & History
The obsolete adjective is borrowed from French ridicule, from Latin rīdiculus (“laughable, comical, amusing, absurd, ridiculous”), from ridere (“to laugh”). The noun is either from French, noun use of adjective, or from Latin rīdiculum, noun use of neuter of rīdiculus. The verb is from the noun or else from French ridiculer, from ridicule.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Safe from the Bar, the Pulpit, and the Throne, / Yet touch'd and sham'd by Ridicule alone."
— 1738, Alexander Pope, Epilogue to the Satires: Dialogue II:
"When he was young you'd not find him doing well in school,
His mind would turn unto the waters.
Always the focus of adolescent ridicule,
He has no time for farmer's daughters.
Alienated from the clique society,
A lonely boy finds peace in fishing."
— 1989, “John the Fisherman”, performed by Primus:
"[Marlborough] was so miserably ignorant, that his deficiencies made him the ridicule of his contemporaries."
— 1857, Henry Thomas Buckle, History of Civilization in England:
"To the people […] but a trifle, to the king but a ridicule."
— 1563 March 30 (Gregorian calendar), John Foxe, Actes and Monuments of These Latter and Perillous Dayes, […], London: […] Iohn Day, […], →OCLC:
"to see the ridicule of this monstrous practice"
— 1710 March 31 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “MONDAY, March 21, 1709–1710”, in The Spectator, number 18; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume I, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC:
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CEFR Practice Quiz
The new student faced constant ____ from his classmates for his accent.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The comedian used gentle ____ to expose the absurdity of the government's latest policy announcement.