MEANING
1. To treat someone in a way that diminishes their dignity, worth, or standing.
2. To become worse in quality or effectiveness, or cause something to do so.
3. To break down into simpler chemical forms, or cause a substance to do so.
Use it for
describing treatment that strips someone of dignity; showing humiliation imposed by another person; distinguishing degradation from ordinary criticism; portraying a system that treats people as worthlessSeparates humiliation, reduced quality, chemical breakdown, and a physical lowering that is not merely a judgment of worth. Writing functions: Decay / Loss of worth.
Words that belong together
- degrade a person
- degrade human dignity
- feel degraded
On the page
The ritual was designed to degrade the prisoners before anyone questioned them.
She could accept criticism of the work but not language that degraded its makers.
Each copy degraded the recording until the words became difficult to distinguish.
The abandoned drainage channels slowly degraded the surrounding marsh.
The material degraded under prolonged exposure to light.
Word forms
- Base
- degrade
- Past tense
- degraded
- Past participle
- degraded
- Present participle
- degrading
Full tense & aspect guide
- Present
- degrade
- Present continuous
- am/is/are degrading
- Present perfect
- have/has degraded
- Present perfect continuous
- have/has been degrading
- Past
- degraded
- Past continuous
- was/were degrading
- Past perfect
- had degraded
- Past perfect continuous
- had been degrading
- Future
- will degrade
- Future continuous
- will be degrading
- Future perfect
- will have degraded
- Future perfect continuous
- will have been degrading
Choose the auxiliary that agrees with your subject. These are constructions of one word, not separate entries.
Usage notes
Verb: degrade; degrades; degraded; degraded; degrading. Future: will degrade. Human humiliation is transitive; deterioration, chemical breakdown, and orbital lowering can be intransitive or transitive. Register: neutral. Commonness: moderately common (qualitative editorial estimate, informed by dictionaries/corpus).
Practice this word in a sentenceYour margin notes
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