double entendre
a double meaning.
a word or expression used in a given context so that it can be understood in two ways, especially when one meaning is risqué.
Origin of double entendre
1Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
How to use double entendre in a sentence
"Hello Kitty" as a double entendre is actually surprisingly modest and sneaky.
Avril Lavigne’s Dumb ‘Hello Kitty’ Video Is Rife with Cultural Appropriation | Amy Zimmerman | April 25, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTThe double entendre works, says Ward, whose job includes inventing these combinations and giving them catchy names.
Hotels Lure High-End Clients With In-Room Cocktail Service | Elyse Moody | July 15, 2012 | THE DAILY BEASTThe title The Bang Bang Club could almost be a double entendre, considering how much sex you guys have in the film.
Axe drives a double entendre into the ground with this little doozy.
The book is called Help—a postmodern touch and, for the long-suffering maids, a clever double-entendre.
A double-entendre is designed here, and the same is often to be found in old plays.
Now large teeth do not lend themselves to well-spoken comedy scenes, to smiles, or to double entendre.
The Elusive Pimpernel | Baroness Emmuska OrczyIt was impossible to think of telling her a nasty story, a "double entendre" fell flat when she was there.
My War Experiences in Two Continents | Sarah MacnaughtanI answered hastily, trying to avoid the unpleasant double entendre, and choosing to accept it in its strictly explicit phase.
The Long Day | Dorothy RichardsonThough a good fellow and a wisely humorous one, he seldom said any thing whose cleverness lay in a double-entendre.
British Dictionary definitions for double entendre
/ (ˈdʌbəl ɑːnˈtɑːndrə, -ˈtɑːnd, French dubl ɑ̃tɑ̃drə) /
a word, phrase, etc, that can be interpreted in two ways, esp one having one meaning that is indelicate
the type of humour that depends upon such ambiguity
Origin of double entendre
1Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Cultural definitions for double-entendre
[ (dub-uhl-ahn-tahn-druh; dooh-blahnn-tahnn-druh) ]
A word or expression that has two different meanings (in French, double-entendre means “double meaning”), one of which is often bawdy or indelicate. A double-entendre is found in this sentence: “A nudist camp is simply a place where men and women meet to air their differences.”
The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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