Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Lack of refinement or polish.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The state or character of being inelegant; want of elegance or refinement; lack of any quality required by good taste.
- n. That which is inelegant or ungraceful: as, inelegances of style.
Wiktionary
- n. The state or quality of being inelegant; lack of grace, refinement, beauty, or polish in language, composition, or manners.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The quality of being inelegant; lack of elegance or grace; lack of refinement, beauty, or polish in language, composition, or manners.
- n. Anything inelegant.
WordNet 3.0
- n. the quality of lacking refinement and good taste
Etymologies
- Latin inelegantia: compare French inélégance. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“I find it funny that for you, Winter is an "inelegance" - I've lived in Chicago for a year and I know EXACTLY what you mean, what with not being able to leave the house without looking like a puff-ball and still be freezing only to remove the layers of puff and be covered in feathers from your jacket!”
“Bien narrer is an object of their study; and though they sometimes carry it to affectation, they never sink into inelegance, which is much the worst extreme of the two.”
Letters to his son on The Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman
“Bien narrer' is an object of their study; and though they sometimes carry it to affectation, they never sink into inelegance, which is much the worst extreme of the two.”
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman, 1751
““The legitimacy of the prepositional ending in literary English must be uncompromisingly maintained; in respect of elegance or inelegance, every example must be judged not by any arbitrary rule, but on its own merits …””
“Really?" she said, already regretting her helpless inelegance.”
“Mr. McGuire, now in his 23rd year at '21,' seems to lament the new leniency, and the inelegance of it all.”
“* Got my project 5.9, with a lot of thrash and inelegance.”
“This document, along with all it's stylistic failings and its imponderable inelegance, is presented before the ire of public with the expectation of out and out derision.”
“My guess would be that her headmaster born in the late 16th century, no doubt, when men were men and rules were rules rapped her on her noggin for inelegance at some crucial point in her development, and voilà!”
“These are all works in progress, and all lacking context, so excuse any present inelegance; the final versions will be great, I swear.”
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