as in ignorant
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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
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
Adjective
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But even for someone like myself, totally ignorant to the lore and not really seeking to change that, the Star Wars universe can look genuinely interesting, and some games every now and then manage to tap into that potential.—
Adam Ismail,
The Drive,
30 Apr. 2026
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Jahmil Eady – Freaky As gentrifiers take over her neighborhood, a Gullah Geechee woman, Annabelle (Melanie Nicholls-King) calls on ancestral knowledge, which has dire consequences for the newcomers who have begun to take over the land, ignorant of its history.—
Richard Newby,
HollywoodReporter,
27 Apr. 2026
Adjective
-
Regrettably, their students are chronically uneducated.—
Chicago Tribune,
Chicago Tribune,
30 Apr. 2026
-
Quit dismissing them as uneducated.—
Ashley Hume,
FOXNews.com,
27 Apr. 2026
Adjective
-
The sort of person known to spend bus rides teaching illiterate teammates how to read, a process likely guided by a primer text booklet, Kendrick said.—
Kansas City Star,
Kansas City Star,
1 May 2026
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His paternal grandparents were peasants in Transylvania; his maternal grandparents were also peasants, and his grandmother was illiterate.—
Rebecca Mead,
New Yorker,
13 Apr. 2026
Adjective
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Such a practice would have been especially useful in nonliterate societies where knowledge was transmitted orally.—
Amanda Fortini,
New York Times,
12 Nov. 2020
Adjective
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He’s introduced it to diners in formerly benighted, hash-less regions, including Texas.—
Robert F. Moss,
Southern Living,
16 Apr. 2026
-
Repeal the benighted Jones Act, which raises energy and shipping costs.—
Editorial,
Boston Herald,
30 Mar. 2026
Adjective
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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
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Peeta explained unlearned stimuli cause AVs to simply stop.—
Doug Turnbull,
AJC.com,
25 Jan. 2026
Adjective
-
No untutored voice, nor even sound of rushing car disturbed the seemingly sacred stillness of the hour.—
Erin Alberty,
Axios,
14 Apr. 2025
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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
Adjective
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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
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By comparison, Danceny is practically a boy, unschooled in the art of manipulation, and Reeves provides the character with the appropriate youthful naïveté.—
Tim Grierson,
Vulture,
18 Oct. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Functionally illiterate.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/functionally%20illiterate. Accessed 10 May. 2026.
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