nonsense
/ˈnɑn.sɛns/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.21 in modern English
8
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
2
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
Letters or words, in writing or speech, that have no meaning or pattern or seem to have no meaning.
Uncountable
noun
That which is silly, illogical and lacks any meaning, reason or value; that which does not make sense.
Uncountable
noun
A type of poetry that contains strange or surreal ideas, as, for example, that written by Edward Lear.
Uncountable
noun
A damaged DNA sequence whose products are not biologically active, that is, that does nothing.
Uncountable
verb
To make nonsense of;
verb
To attempt to dismiss as nonsense; to ignore or belittle the significance of something; to render unimportant or puny.
Example Sentences
- "After my father had a stroke, every time he tried to talk, it sounded like nonsense."
- "You have seen it for yourselves in the play by Aristophanes, where Socrates goes whirling round, proclaiming that he is walking on air, and uttering a great deal of other nonsense about things of which I know nothing whatsoever."
- "While at the hospital, David kept screaming and yelling nonsense, stating Vladimir Putin bailed him out of jail and is a god."
- "and central banks lend vast sums against marshmallow backed securities, or other nonsenses creative bankers dreamed up."
- "At the Haymarket all this is nonsensed by an endeavor to steer between Mr. Stanley Weyman's rights as author of the story and the prescriptive right of the leading actor to fight popularly and heroically against heavy odds."
- ""They haven't nonsensed these workouts. They've taken them and used them very well. I didn't know how they'd respond, but they've responded.""
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *né Proto-Germanic *ne Proto-Indo-European *ís? Proto-Indo-European *h₁óynos Proto-Germanic *ainaz Proto-Germanic *nainaz Proto-West Germanic *nain Old English nān Middle English non ▲ Old English nān Old English nān- Middle English non- English non- Proto-Indo-European *sent-der. Proto-Italic *sentiō Latin sentiō Proto-Indo-European *-tus Proto-Italic *-tus Latin -tus Latin sēnsusbor. Proto-Germanic *sinnaz Frankish *sinnbor. Vulgar Latin *sennus Old French sensbor. Middle English sense English sense English nonsense From non- (“no, none, lack of”) + sense, from c. 1610. Compare the semantically similar West Frisian ûnsin (“nonsense”), Dutch onzin (“nonsense”), German Unsinn (“nonsense”), English unsense (“nonsense”).
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈnɑn.sɛns/
- British English: /ˈnɒn.səns/
Usage
Inflected Forms
nonsenses (plural)
nonsence (alternative, archaic)
non-sense (alternative)
nonsenses (present, singular)
nonsensing (participle, present)
nonsensed (participle, past)
nonsensed (past)
more nonsense (comparative)
most nonsense (superlative)