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askance [ uh -skans ] SHOW IPA
/ əˈskæns / PHONETIC RESPELLING
📓 High School LevelThis shows grade level based on the word's complexity.
adverb
with suspicion, mistrust, or disapproval: He looked askance at my offer.
with a side glance; sidewise; obliquely.
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Also
a·skant [uh -skant ]. /əˈskænt/. Origin of askance First recorded in 1520–30; earlier a scanche, a sca(u)nce; of obscure origin
Words nearby askance -asis ,
as it were ,
A sizes ,
ask ,
ask after ,
askance ,
Ask, and it shall be given you ,
askarel ,
askari ,
ask a stupid question and you'll get a stupid answer ,
askew
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
How to use askance in a sentence In their theology, elites look askance at the most vulnerable even though it is the most vulnerable — the poor, the outcasts — who can redeem a flawed world.
Unless, of course, they are the type who looks at things slightly askance .
I admit that I looked askance at this book for quite some time before digging in, thinking, that I knew exactly how to grill vegetables.
He sulks when something doesn’t go his way, bows his head and looks askance when he’s doing something he knows he shouldn’t, throws everything within reach on the floor when he’s angry.
When they sported men’s clothing and took their cat for walks on a leash, skeptical islanders surely looked askance .
Establishment figures look a bit askance at the Kentucky senator because of his isolationist roots.
Her gay fans will look askance and move on around Streisand.
Short sellers—investors who look for overvalued stock they hope will go down—have also looked askance at SodaStream.
They'd look awfully askance at anything like this happening five or whatever weeks before an election.
To hear her friends tell it, she is a bit like one of the fearsome middle-school girls who was looking askance at Swift.
He eyed Bumble askance as he entered, but scarcely deigned to nod his head in acknowledgment of his salutation.
And the conversation then broke down, and the brothers looked askance at one another in silence.
I thought they looked at me askance , and I made sure that the more superstitious crossed themselves on my approach.
We crave and struggle for individuality; here was mine restored to me, and I looked at it askance .
Many shrugged their shoulders, while Capitan Toringoy merely looked askance at Isagani.
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British Dictionary definitions for askance
adverb
with an oblique glance
with doubt or mistrust
Word Origin for askance C16: of unknown origin
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Other Idioms and Phrases with askance
The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary
Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.