denigrate

verb den·i·grate \ ˈde-ni-ˌgrāt \

|Updated on: 19 Jun 2018

Examples: denigrate in a Sentence

Editor's Note: Did You Know?

Definition of denigrate

denigrated; denigrating

transitive verb

1 : to attack the reputation of : defame

denigrate one's opponents

2 : to deny the importance or validity of : belittle

denigrate their achievements

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denigration

play \ˌde-ni-ˈgrā-shən\ noun

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denigrative

play \ˈde-ni-ˌgrā-tiv\ adjective

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denigrator

play \-ˌgrā-tər\ noun

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denigratory

play \ˈde-ni-grə-ˌtȯr-ē\ adjective

See denigrate defined for English-language learners

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Examples of denigrate in a Sentence

Her story denigrates him as a person and as a teacher.
No one is trying to denigrate the importance of a good education. We all know that it is crucial for success.
denigrating the talents and achievements of women

Recent Examples of denigrate from the Web

Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the US democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency.

— aaron blake, Washington Post, "Trump DHS secretary’s bizarre comments about Russian election interference," 22 May 2018
Image The basics Russia carried out a campaign to influence the outcome of the 2016 American presidential election, denigrating Hillary Clinton and boosting Donald J. Trump, according to American intelligence agencies.

— mikayla bouchard, New York Times, "The Russia Investigation Is Complicated. Here’s What It All Means.," 16 May 2018
At a time when there’s abundant evidence that the disappearance of local newspapers has denigrated civic life, Musk seems to think that what journalism really needs is another aggregator.

— adrienne lafrance, The Atlantic, "Elon Musk Should Know Better," 29 May 2018
Other Conservative lawmakers have expressed concern that Trudeau’s apologies are tarnishing the country’s image and unnecessarily denigrating its achievements.

— amanda coletta, Washington Post, "Trudeau will apologize for Canada’s rejection of Jewish refugees in 1939. Is he saying ‘sorry’ too often?," 25 May 2018
Sara got permission, and qipaos were never used to denigrate Chinese women in America nor China.

— connie wang, refinery29.com, "I’ve Written About Cultural Appropriation For 10 Years. Here’s What I Got Wrong.," 24 May 2018
Coming from an administration that has often denigrated the value of such research, that’s good news.

— jeffrey mervis, Science | AAAS, "Social science research makes surprise appearance in rollout of Melania Trump’s children’s initiative," 10 May 2018
Trump could no doubt find some other superficial means of denigrating Chuck Todd.

— katy steinmetz, Time, "Avoiding Phrases With Unseemly Origins Is More Complicated Than You Might Think," 26 Apr. 2018
For a long time now the status of women has been denigrated by all governments.

— Fox News, "Protests in Spain after 5 imprisoned on lesser charge in Pamplona 'gang rape'," 26 Apr. 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'denigrate.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Did You Know?

If you "denigrate" someone, you attempt to blacken their reputation. It makes sense, therefore, that "denigrate" can be traced back to the Latin verb denigrare, meaning "to blacken." When "denigrate" was first used in English in the 16th century, it meant to cast aspersions on someone's character or reputation. Eventually, it developed a second sense of "to make black" ("factory smoke denigrated the sky"), but this sense is somewhat rare in modern usage. Nowadays, of course, "denigrate" can also refer to belittling the worth or importance of someone or something.