scornful
part of speech
adjective (scornful, more scornful, most scornful)
meaning for a pupil
1) Showing that you think someone or something is worthless, silly or not good enough. tree →
2) A scornful look, laugh or voice is one that mocks or looks down on someone. tree →
sense in the lessons
A feelings and character word in stories: it tells the reader a character feels superior and does not respect someone. Writers pair it with a look, laugh, voice or glance: «a scornful laugh», «scornful of». In Alice in Wonderland many creatures are scornful of Alice, like the Caterpillar who asks «You! Who are you?» in a scornful tone; in The Wind in the Willows the weasels are scornful of the animals of the river bank until Badger returns. In everyday life being scornful hurts people and is a kind of rudeness.
examples
- She gave a scornful laugh when he said he could beat her at chess. tree →
- «You call that a sandcastle?» said Tom in a scornful voice. tree →
- The Caterpillar looked at Alice in a scornful way. tree →
- Don't be scornful of other people's ideas; listen first. tree →
- The older girls were scornful of the little ones' game. tree →
- He was scornful of anyone who supported the other football team. tree →
- Her scornful glance made him feel very small. tree →
- One day as the Lion walked proudly down a forest aisle, and the animals respectfully made way for him, an Ass brayed a scornful remark as he passed. tree →
note
Adjective; the noun is «scorn» and the adverb «scornfully». «Scornful of something» means looking down on it. Do not mix up with «scorn» used as a verb: «She scorned the offer». Opposite: respectful, admiring.
In the corpora
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «scornful» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.