debase
Americanverb (used with object)
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debases,
present (3rd person singular)
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debased,
past participle, past
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debasing
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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debasesimple
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debasessimple
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have debasedperfect
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has debasedperfect
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am debasingprogressive
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are debasingprogressive
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is debasingprogressive
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have been debasingperfect progressive
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has been debasingperfect progressive
Past
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debasedsimple
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had debasedperfect
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was debasingprogressive
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were debasingprogressive
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had been debasingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of debase
Explanation
To debase something is to make it corrupt or impure. If your lemonade stand sells “pure lemonade,” you’d insist on using real lemons instead of a mix; using a mix would debase your product. Debase is often used in the context of two things: coins and people. To debase a coin is to replace some of the precious metal in the coin with metal of lesser value. To debase a person is to corrupt them, often by driving them to perform an immoral act like (gasp!) using the lemonade mix. Just promise us you won’t do it.
Vocabulary lists containing debase
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"The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
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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.
See Examples For:
That trade is based on the view that investors will turn to alternative assets like gold or bitcoin on worries that stubborn government deficits and higher inflation will debase currencies like the dollar.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 27, 2026
These stories tell us that Diogenes was chased out of his native Sinope, on the north coast of what’s now Turkey, for his supposed role in a scheme to debase the city’s currency.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 17, 2025
I knew he was trying to be menacing, but I didn’t feel fear so much as astonishment at the way this adult was willing to debase himself to ruin our night.
From Slate ● Feb. 10, 2025
As the string score starts having palpitations, “Babygirl” threatens to debase itself by becoming a throwback thriller.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 24, 2024
Just because the world was unjust didn’t mean that I must debase myself as well.
From "The City Beautiful" by Aden Polydoros
In order to emerge victorious in his quest to bring the World Cup to Mexico, De la Torre debases himself and backstabs shamelessly.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 4, 2026
And that vision, that fight, in the midst of everything that degrades and debases you, you pull upon community, you pull upon cultural power, you pull upon your spirituality, and you pull upon hope.
From Slate ● Oct. 6, 2020
Said corporation's very wealthy owner insults the court and her client, then debases Julius himself after the judge has the man jailed for contempt, which he is well within his rights to do.
From Salon ● May 14, 2020
Rather than explore complex issues and troubling experiences by way of sci-fi future-historical fantasy, “Alita: Battle Angel” debases them—and its exemplary character—under the force of a blinkered and reactionary model of drama and business alike.
From The New Yorker ● Feb. 13, 2019
It is so simple a fact and one that is so hard, apparently, to grasp: Whoever debases others is debasing himself.
From "The Fire Next Time" by James Baldwin
A currency is never debased in the hearing.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 15, 2026
Whereas the European gothic, he concludes, was “an enlightened attack on a debased ruling class or entrenched superstition,” its American version emerged as “a Calvinist exposé of natural human corruption.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 22, 2026
The very concepts of intellectualism, and of objective knowledge itself, have been debased by a kind of Gresham’s Law, with the bad driving out the good.
From Salon ● Apr. 19, 2026
There will be a new ball this season, the Nike Flight, which is "built with Aerowsculpt technology with grooves debased into the casing, to allow air to travel seamlessly around the ball, delivering truer flight".
From BBC ● Aug. 15, 2024
I’ve been debased through my association with you.
From "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole
Robbie’s most deliciously debasing scene is when she throws coins on the ground for a desperate beggar — and then that person forces her to watch as he picks them up.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 11, 2026
The late Roman Empire undermined its commercial economy through centralization, regulation and debasing the currency.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 29, 2025
Dismissing the case, Mr Justice Chamberlain said Yaxley-Lennon's own barrister had accepted there was no evidence his client had been segregated "for the purpose of breaking his resistance or humiliating or debasing him".
From BBC ● Mar. 21, 2025
But Kidman isn’t debasing herself or regressing just for the sick sight of it all.
From Salon ● Dec. 23, 2024
It is so simple a fact and one that is so hard, apparently, to grasp: Whoever debases others is debasing himself.
From "The Fire Next Time" by James Baldwin
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.
