incorrigible
Americanadjective
-
not corrigible; bad beyond correction or reform.
incorrigible behavior; an incorrigible liar.
-
impervious to constraints or punishment; willful; unruly; uncontrollable.
an incorrigible child; incorrigible hair.
-
firmly fixed; not easily changed.
an incorrigible habit.
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not easily swayed or influenced.
an incorrigible optimist.
noun
adjective
-
beyond correction, reform, or alteration
-
firmly rooted; ineradicable
-
philosophy (of a belief) having the property that whoever honestly believes it cannot be mistaken Compare defeasible
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of incorrigible
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English word from Latin word incorrigibilis. See in- 3, corrigible
Explanation
Someone incorrigible seems to be beyond correcting, improving, or changing. When you talk about an incorrigible bully, you're saying they're always going to push other people around. Even though incorrigible implies a person is kind of hopeless, it's often used as a light-hearted word. When we describe someone as an incorrigible flirt or as an incorrigible gossip, we mean that this is just the way they are, and it would be foolish to try and change them. If someone is just being obnoxious as usual, you could say "You're incorrigible!"
Vocabulary lists containing incorrigible
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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"Letter from Birmingham Jail" by Martin Luther King, Jr. (1963)
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Anti-Antonyms: Words Without Opposites
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
She reports on how teachers are exasperated by her talkativeness, setting her a series of punishment essays titled A Chatterbox, then An Incorrigible Chatterbox, and finally Quack, quack, quack, said Mistress Chatterback.
From The Guardian • May 25, 2019
Incorrigible cinemaddicts may insist on regarding Charles Boyer as a romantic figure�even in his shabby overcoat and battered hat.
From Time Magazine Archive
Incorrigible, homeless children, orphaned by war, revolution, famine, abound like alley cats, sleeping for the most part where night overtakes them.
From Time Magazine Archive
Song and Dance G. B. S. Proves Himself an Incorrigible Idealist George Bernard Shaw presented to the world, with the season's greetings, three gifts—a play, a speech, a remark.
From Time Magazine Archive
Even Simon Harley-Dickinson must have wondered, from his ever-changing position in the theatrical firmament: What had become of Alexander, Beowulf, and Cassiopeia Incorrigible, the three wards of Lord Fredrick Ashton, of Ashton Place, England?
From "The Long-Lost Home" by Maryrose Wood
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
