Synonyms

repugnance

American

[ri-puhg-nuhns] / rɪˈpʌg nəns /

Also repugnancy

noun

the state of being repugnant.
strong distaste, aversion, or objection; antipathy.

Synonyms:

hostility, hatred

Antonyms:

liking, attraction
contradictoriness or inconsistency.

Synonyms:

irreconcilability, incompatibility, contrariety

Antonyms:

compatibility

Related Words

See dislike.

Etymology

Origin of repugnance

1350–1400; Middle English < Middle French < Latin repugnantia, equivalent to repugn ( āre ) to repugn + -antia -ance

Explanation

Repugnance means strong distaste for something. If you love animals, you probably feel repugnance for people who mistreat their horses. The word repugnance comes from Latin root words, re, meaning back, and pugnare, to fight. When we use repugnance, we don't just mean the feeling of fighting back or resisting, but also a feeling of horror or sickness that causes you to resist in the first place. If something grosses you out, you feel repugnance for it. Repugnance can also express a feeling of moral horror: you probably feel repugnance at photographs of torture.

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Vocabulary lists containing repugnance

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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.

Repugnance, he laments, tilts the political playing field against ideas that unlock the gains from trade.

From Economist • Feb. 22, 2018

Dowling raised it to a maturity rite by pronouncing as follows: "Repugnance to tax collectors is a persistent infantilism."

From Time Magazine Archive

Regent’s Repugnance to Retrenchment and Reform.—Marriage of the Princess Charlotte.—Satire on the Purchase of the xii “Elgin Marbles.”

From English Caricaturists and Graphic Humourists of the Nineteenth Century. How they Illustrated and Interpreted their Times. by Everitt, Graham

Next she’s in my life— The second stage of the fever—as dislike, Repugnance, and I wish her out of sight, Out of my life.

From Domesday Book by Masters, Edgar Lee

Repugnance to American tendencies and influences had a strong representation in the Curia and in powerful circles in Rome.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 13, Slice 2 "Hearing" to "Helmond" by Various

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023