pretentious

pre·ten·tious

adjective \pri-ˈten(t)-shəs\

Definition of PRETENTIOUS

1

: characterized by pretension: as

a : making usually unjustified or excessive claims (as of value or standing) <the pretentious fraud who assumes a love of culture that is alien to him — Richard Watts>

b : expressive of affected, unwarranted, or exaggerated importance, worth, or stature <pretentious language> <pretentious houses>

2

: making demands on one's skill, ability, or means : ambitious <the pretentious daring of the Green Mountain Boys in crossing the lake — American Guide Series: Vermont>

— pre·ten·tious·ly adverb

— pre·ten·tious·ness noun

Examples of PRETENTIOUS

1. The houses in the neighborhood are large and pretentious.
2. <that pretentious couple always serves caviar at their parties, even though they themselves dislike it>
3. It is hard to be pretentious or elevated in Yiddish, and easy to poke fun. —Cynthia Ozick, New Yorker, 28 Mar. 1988
4. To anyone ignorant of the underlying physics, it might seem the most arrogant and pretentious necromancy. —Carl Sagan, Contact, 1985
5. She seemed at that first meeting a little pretentious and a would-be intellectual—she was studying sociology in the States, a subject which thrives on banalities and abstract jargon … —Graham Greene, Getting to Know the General, 1984
6. … and then a P.S. running into 20 pages both sides of the paper and coming back to the top of page one—Hegel, Nietzsche, Emerson, Gide, Beethoven, Suarez—all the boys trotted out in reams of pretentious blather. —Myles na Gopaleen (Flann O' Brien), The Best of Myles, 1968

Origin of PRETENTIOUS

French prétentieux, from prétention pretension, from Medieval Latin pretention-, pretentio, from Latin praetendere

First Known Use: 1832

Related to PRETENTIOUS

Synonyms

affected, grandiose, highfalutin (also hifalutin), high-minded, la-di-da (also la-de-da or lah-de-dah or lah-dee-dah or lah-di-dah), ostentatious, pompous, snippy

Antonyms

modest, unpretentious

Related Words

airy, grandiloquent, high-flown, high-sounding, high-toned, sententious; arrogant, bumptious, complacent, conceited, egoistic (also egoistical), egotistic (or egotistical), high-and-mighty, high-handed, high-hat, hoity-toity, imperious, important, overweening, presumptuous, prideful, proud, self-asserting, self-assertive, self-centered, self-complacent, self-conceited, self-important, self-obsessed, self-pleased, self-satisfied, smug, uppity, vain, vainglorious; self-aggrandizing, self-dramatizing, self-glorifying, self-promoting; cavalier, disdainful, haughty, lordly, snobbish, snobby, stuck-up, supercilious, superior; confident, self-assured, self-confident, sure; boastful, braggart, bragging; aggressive, assertive, audacious, bold, brassy, cheeky, cocky, forward, impudent, insolent, rude; flamboyant, flashy, flaunting, garish, gaudy, glitzy, showy, splashy

Near Antonyms

demure, down-to-earth, homely, humble, lowly, meek, retiring, unassertive, unassuming; bashful, diffident, mousy (or mousey), overmodest, passive, quiet, reserved, shy, timid

See Synonym Discussion at showy