sophisticate
Americannoun
adjective
verb (used with object)
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to make less natural, simple, or ingenuous; make worldly-wise.
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to alter; pervert.
to sophisticate a meaning beyond recognition.
verb (used without object)
verb
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(tr) to make (someone) less natural or innocent, as by education
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to pervert or corrupt (an argument, etc) by sophistry
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(tr) to make more complex or refined
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rare to falsify (a text, etc) by alterations
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of sophisticate
1350–1400; Middle English (adj. and v.) < Medieval Latin sophisticātus (past participle of sophisticāre to tamper with, disguise, trick with words), equivalent to Latin sophistic ( us ) ( see sophistic) + -ātus -ate 1
Explanation
To sophisticate is to make someone or something less innocent. A sophisticate is also a worldly, cultured person. The root soph in sophisticate has to do with knowledge, and if a person gets sophisticated, they learn new things, especially about the social world. Parents sophisticate their children by teaching them table manners. Going to college sophisticates many people by exposing them to new ideas and other cultures. After becoming sophisticated, people are less natural and innocent, but more cultured. A sophisticate is also a worldly person. Sophisticates do things like go to the opera and drink fine wine.
Vocabulary lists containing sophisticate
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.
Released in 1979, this City Sophisticate outfit had a faux-fur-trimmed coat and skirt accented by a yellow soutache braid.
From New York Times • Apr. 24, 2019
For more on their relationship, which could kindly be described as fraught, here’s Tahani’s interview with International Sophisticate Magazine from the show’s second season:
From Slate • Jan. 6, 2019
The Economist Tends Its Sophisticate Garden Its fire-engine-red logo peeks out of fashionable handbags and from the back pockets of designer jeans.
From New York Times • Aug. 9, 2010
Sophisticate Van Vechten wondered what Huysmans would have thought of such goings-on.
From Time Magazine Archive
He was flushed and restless, but he doubted if he would feel happier on the first-night with the entire Sophisticate body howling for "author."
From Black Oxen by Atherton, Gertrude Franklin Horn
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.
