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functionally illiterate

adjective

as in ignorant

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Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of functionally illiterate For 32 years of his life, the personal trainer was functionally illiterate. — Clare Mulroy, USA Today, 25 Feb. 2026 Stillman, like Goodnow and many other teachers, noted that AI can help tailor her lessons for students of different abilities, creating more-advanced activities for higher-performing students and more-basic tasks for students who are functionally illiterate in English. — Jared Perlo, NBC news, 22 Dec. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for functionally illiterate
  1. ignorant
  2. uneducated
  3. illiterate
  4. nonliterate
  5. benighted
  6. unlearned
  7. untutored
  8. unschooled
Adjective
  • The old worst dressed lists could be cruel, sexist, culturally ignorant, and spectacularly misguided.
    — Derek C. Blasberg, Vanity Fair, 27 Aug. 2026
  • Mamdani’s ignorant opinion illustrates Kissinger’s concern, relying on emotional display rather than the facts.
    — Daniel Kolkey, Oc Register, 16 Aug. 2026
Definition of ignorant
Adjective
  • Ira, in my very uneducated opinion, there are eight teams in the East that could finish first, and any of those eight could be eighth.
    — Ira Winderman, Sun Sentinel, 24 Sep. 2026
  • As a peripheral community grows around them, this lawless terrain is suddenly subject to boundaries and contracts and taxes; both uneducated and illiterate, Isak and Inger are ill prepared for such societal evolution.
    — Guy Lodge, Variety, 16 Sep. 2026
Definition of uneducated
Adjective
  • As a peripheral community grows around them, this lawless terrain is suddenly subject to boundaries and contracts and taxes; both uneducated and illiterate, Isak and Inger are ill prepared for such societal evolution.
    — Guy Lodge, Variety, 16 Sep. 2026
  • Her father was an illiterate sharecropper whose 12 children shared a one-room cabin with no running water or electricity.
    — The Week US, TheWeek, 8 Sep. 2026
Definition of illiterate
Adjective
  • Such a practice would have been especially useful in nonliterate societies where knowledge was transmitted orally.
    — Amanda Fortini, New York Times, 12 Nov. 2020
Definition of nonliterate
Adjective
  • Could Kleist’s conjecture provide a key to their seeming vacancy, their resignation, their helplessness, suggesting that in their benighted condition lies spiritual perfection?
    — Matthew McLean, Artforum, 22 Sep. 2026
  • But this time there would be no panel from the National Endowment of the Arts sifting through the applications, no oversight from cultural officials and benighted curators—the usual process.
    — Nate Freeman, Vanity Fair, 8 May 2026
Definition of benighted
Adjective
  • Error patterns go untracked, lessons go unlearned and misaligned agents continue to operate unchecked.
    — Victoria Chin, Forbes.com, 19 Feb. 2026
  • De-Stalinization was quick and brutal, with history having the last say — a lesson guaranteed to go unlearned.
    — Voice of the People, New York Daily News, 15 Feb. 2026
Definition of unlearned
Adjective
  • No untutored voice, nor even sound of rushing car disturbed the seemingly sacred stillness of the hour.
    — Erin Alberty, Axios, 14 Apr. 2025
  • His savage, untutored mind suggested no better way than that of wreaking vengeance upon those who had wronged him.
    — Liz Tracey, JSTOR Daily, 21 Feb. 2025
Definition of untutored
Adjective
  • Scholars hazarded theories as to how an unschooled middle-aged Black woman from the South could brush with genius.
    — Doreen St. Félix, New Yorker, 5 Sep. 2026
  • Mata was also concerned about how the data failed to display how INA staff works with the lowest English proficiency students in the district — specifically those who are unschooled, and oftentimes refugees who have just entered the country.
    — Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 28 Apr. 2026
Definition of unschooled

Browse Nearby Words

functional illiteracy
functionally illiterate
functionaries
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Cite this Entry

“Functionally illiterate.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/functionally%20illiterate. Accessed 30 Sep. 2026.

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