indelicacy
Americannoun
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the quality or condition of being indelicate.
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something indelicate, as language or behavior.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of indelicacy
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:
I was listening to them talk of quality and seasonability when the young perfumer, with all the indelicacy of a greenhorn, announced, “I have some oudh.”
From New York Times ● May 10, 2021
It was an accusation against a close U.S. ally that had never been voiced so publicly and with such indelicacy.
From Seattle Times ● Aug. 2, 2017
In the US, meanwhile, it is consumed by feckless millions who harbor no qualms about the indelicacy of the name.
From The Guardian ● Mar. 17, 2016
"We are mortified and grieved that he should have been guilty of such great indelicacy and impropriety," said the New York Courier and Enquirer, then the country's most popular paper.
From BBC ● Feb. 14, 2012
We have as much distaste for talking about personal death as for thinking about it; it is an indelicacy, like talking in mixed company about venereal disease or abortion in the old days.
From "The Lives of a Cell" by Lewis Thomas
Memories stirred by Mr. Hartley — an Australian filmmaker who has explored such indelicacies as Filipino exploitation cinema, in the documentary “Machete Maidens Unleashed!” — are not warm and fuzzy.
From New York Times ● Sep. 7, 2014
For instance, basketball fans know full well the indelicacies of college recruiting but are ready to imagine that their school's pituitary catch matriculated like any other student and went out for the team.
From Time Magazine Archive
Puritans and preachers classified novel reading with such female indelicacies as leg-crossing and nose-blowing.
From Time Magazine Archive
These indelicacies are mimed in silhouette behind a scrim.
From Time Magazine Archive
Unsavory sorts murmured indelicacies at cutlet stands; grandmothers consulted almanacs to determine a propitious hour for the betrothal.
From "Interpreter of Maladies" by Jhumpa Lahiri
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.
