To discomfit someone is to make them feel uncomfortable or upset. An easy way to discomfit another person is to use the age-old, childish trick of ignoring them. (Of course, we’re sure you would never do that, right? Right?)
- Pronunciation: /dɪs'kʌmfɪt/
- English description: cause to lose one's composure
- Synonyms: discompose
- Chinese Translation: 挫败(cuo4 bai4)
- Spanish Translation: desconcertar
- ORIGIN: If you make someone blush, sweat, and generally want to disappear, you’ve discomfited her. Centuries ago, discomfit was used to mean “destroy completely in battle” — an experience that surely left the defeated armies feeling something more than mere discomfort. Some scholars have suggested that the contemporary meaning of discomfit arose due to confusion with the word discomfort. Don’t be discomfited by choosing the wrong word; use this word to mean “embarrass.”
EXAMPLE SENTENCE:
- The discomfit could also arise from what the findings mean for estimates about sea-level rise.
- Then there was the girl who entered the program as a 7-year-old and would hide when discomfited.
*New word description, story and part of "EXAMPLE SENTENCE" are cited in Vocabulary.com