coarsen

verb

coars·​en ˈkȯr-sᵊn 

coarsened; coarsening

transitive verb

: to make coarse

intransitive verb

: to become coarse

Examples of coarsen in a Sentence

Her hands were coarsened by years of hard work.

He was coarsened by his time in prison.

offensive words that coarsen the English language

The book describes how popular culture has coarsened in recent decades.

Recent Examples on the Web

At a time of coarsening of public discourse, Oz worked across sectors to show that courage does not require cruelty. —Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, Fortune, 13 Apr. 2023

To his detractors, Roy was — more than any other single figure — responsible for coarsening the political discourse in the United States, eroding public trust in journalism and providing a platform for xenophobia, misogyny and climate denialism. —Meredith Blake, Los Angeles Times, 9 Apr. 2023

Several generations of filmgoers have been so coarsened by dull routine that the unpretentious John Wick brawls directly please their visceral connoisseurship. —Armond White, National Review, 24 Mar. 2023

If Trump’s effect on the Republican Party was simply to coarsen it, then progressives might have grimaced and taken it. —The New Yorker, 16 Apr. 2022

By transitioning from marketplace to megaphone, Twitter will further coarsen America’s political discourse. —Daniel Tenreiro, National Review, 7 Nov. 2019

But Democrats were helping to coarsen it long before Trump came along. —Marc A. Thiessen, The Mercury News, 8 Aug. 2019

In a country so divided and coarsened, does one person’s private struggle for moral purity really matter? —Danny Heitman, WSJ, 30 Dec. 2018

Look, the culture has been coarsened, the entertainment industry, music, film, billboards, television, everything is over sexualized or too violent or just dumped down altogether. —Fox News, 3 Aug. 2018

See More

Word History

First Known Use

1805, in the meaning defined at transitive sense