jeremiad
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of jeremiad
1770–80; Jeremi(ah) + -ad 1 in reference to Jeremiah's Lamentations
Explanation
If a kid who's away at summer camp mails his parents a jeremiad, it means that he sends them a long, sad list of complaints. Use the noun jeremiad to talk about any list of woes, especially a lengthy, mournful one. Many letters to the editors of newspapers and comments on websites are jeremiads, and someone addressing a city council or school board might make a verbal jeremiad — speaking for a long time about their many grievances. The word jeremiad was coined in 1700s France, as jérémiade, and it was a reference to the Old Testament's "Lamentations of Jeremiah."
Vocabulary lists containing jeremiad
There's A Word for That
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You Name It: Eponyms
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National Spelling Bee '14: Prelims Round 2
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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.
His underlying idea isn’t a jeremiad against AI as a whole, but that the market has detached from reality.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 28, 2025
I don’t intend this column to be either a jeremiad or a lambasting of marijuana.
From Salon ● Dec. 31, 2024
But the HBO show is a savage jeremiad, inspiring sympathy for its characters only insofar as they’re prisoners of familial pathology.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 29, 2022
Wender-Shubow said the group reminded her of “that book Winners Take All,” which is Anand Giridharadas’ jeremiad against elite do-gooders who don’t understand that their best intentions are making things worse.
From Slate ● Dec. 18, 2020
Still other insects, unseen but none the less busy, added to the burden of his jeremiad.
From From Place to Place by Cobb, Irvin S. (Irvin Shrewsbury)
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.
