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Definition of feckless
1 : weak, ineffective She can't rely on her feckless son.
2 : worthless, irresponsible a feckless maneuver that could only serve to strengthen the enemy — Simon Schama
fecklessly
adverbfecklessness
nounFrom the M-W Editors
feckless was our Word of the Day on 03/14/2009. Hear the podcast!
Theme music by Joshua Stamper ©2006 New Jerusalem Music/ASCAP
Examples of feckless in a Sentence
She can't rely on her feckless son.
a well-intentioned but feckless response to the rise in school violence
Recent Examples of feckless from the Web
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The heir to a hotel-and-movie franchise, the feckless David Schine had reportedly pulled D’s in his first year at Harvard.
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The heir to a hotel-and-movie franchise, the feckless David Schine had reportedly pulled D’s in his first year at Harvard.
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The dialogue can occasionally feel a bit canned, as if lifted from a lesser sitcom, and the author overplays the scenes of his narrator as a feckless, self-loathing alcoholic, endlessly recycling glimpses of him drunk, drying out and drunk again.
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The dialogue can occasionally feel a bit canned, as if lifted from a lesser sitcom, and the author overplays the scenes of his narrator as a feckless, self-loathing alcoholic, endlessly recycling glimpses of him drunk, drying out and drunk again.
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Or, to put it another way, to make folklore out of the feckless.
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Most point to the limited range of choices offered to Iranian voters as proof that the vote there is mostly theater, cover for the feckless pursuit of power between elites in an autocratic system.
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Historians will also see a feckless Congress—both Democrats and...
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His interrogations are feckless, and his dialogue explores little beyond his own hurt feelings.
These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'feckless'. Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Did You Know?
Someone feckless is lacking in feck. And what, you may ask, is feck? Feck is a Scots term that means "effect" or "majority" and comes from an alteration of the Middle English effect. So something without feck is without effect, or ineffective. In the past, feckful (meaning "efficient," "sturdy," or "powerful") made an occasional appearance. But in this case, the weak has outlived the strong: feckless is a commonly used English word, but feckful has fallen out of use.
Origin and Etymology of feckless
Scots, from feck effect, majority, from Middle English (Scots) fek, alteration of Middle English effect
FECKLESS Defined for English Language Learners
feckless
playDefinition of feckless for English Language Learners
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: having or resulting from a weak character or nature
Learn More about feckless
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See words that rhyme with feckless Thesaurus: All synonyms and antonyms for feckless Spanish Central: Translation of feckless Nglish: Translation of feckless for Spanish speakers Britannica English: Translation of feckless for Arabic speakers
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