dejected
Americanadjective
adjective
Other Word Forms
- dejectedly adverb
- dejectedness noun
- quasi-dejected adjective
- quasi-dejectedly adverb
- undejected adjective
- undejectedly adverb
- undejectedness noun
Etymology
Origin of dejected
Explanation
If you're ejected from an important game, you're going to feel dejected. If you're rejected by the love of your life, you'll feel dejected again. Dejected goes beyond down––it's having given up hope. "After the theater was burned down by Mrs. Jud, the deranged school secretary, the drama students were too dejected even to sing "Pore Jud is Daid" from Oklahoma, the only song that might have made them feel better."
Vocabulary lists containing dejected
Dissed List: Breakup Words for Valentine's Day
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The SAT: Words to Capture Tone, List 3
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The Giver
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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.
Embassy in Bujumbura, Burundi, she watched anxiously as applicant after applicant left dejected.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 25, 2026
SEOUL—After the last whistle blew at the youth women’s World Cup final in November, the Netherlands coach sounded dejected.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 11, 2026
While a dejected England leave for home well beaten and under mounting pressure, Smith told TNT Sports he planned to have "a jar" with counterpart Stokes and commiserate.
From Barron's • Jan. 8, 2026
"At a time when we should be connected, we find ourselves alone, down, dejected," Lindsay Foreman wrote in a poem entitled A Sad Voice From Evin Prison - A Christmas Poem.
From BBC • Dec. 22, 2025
Throughout their conversation, Sticky’s expression had grown more and more dejected, his big eyes sadder and sadder, so that at last his face had taken on the exact gloomy look of that miserable man Milligan.
From "The Mysterious Benedict Society" by Trenton Lee Stewart
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.
