stultify

American  

[stuhl-tuh-fahy] / ˈstʌl təˌfaɪ /

verb (used with object)

stultified, stultifying

1. to render absurdly or wholly futile or ineffectual, especially by degrading or frustrating means.

   Must we stultify the progress of these reforms with yet more red tape?

   Synonyms:

   thwart, negate, impede, frustrate, dull, deaden, benumb

2. Law. to allege or prove (oneself or another person) to be of unsound mind.

3. Older Use. to make, or cause to appear, foolish or ridiculous.

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verb (used without object)

stultified, stultifying

1. to become ineffectual or impaired, especially through frustrating, stifling, or deadening conditions.

   Without an environment of encouragement and creativity, the mind can stultify.

stultify British  

/ ˈstʌltɪˌfaɪ /

verb

1. to make useless, futile, or ineffectual, esp by routine

2. to cause to appear absurd or inconsistent

3. to prove (someone) to be of unsound mind and thus not legally responsible

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Other Word Forms

• nonstultification
  noun
• stultification
  noun
• stultifier
  noun
• unstultified
  adjective
• unstultifying
  adjective
• stultifyingly
  adverb

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Etymology

Origin of stultify

First recorded in 1760–70; from Late Latin stultificāre, equivalent to Latin stult(us) “stupid” + -i- -i- + -ficāre -fy

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Explanation

When something stultifies you, it drains you of your energy, enthusiasm, or pleasure. Listening to an hour-long graduation speech on a hot, humid day might stultify you. The word stultify is sometimes used in place of to "bore" or "exhaust.” An uninspiring boss, too many rules, or a badly performed play can be stultifying. If you hang out in the hot sun all day, the stultifying heat might make you feel limp and listless. Even constant construction noise could stultify a person. To stultify a plan or person is to dampen enthusiasm in a big way.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

stultify stultified stultifying

Not for Gardiner the pietistically devotional approach that can stultify.

From New York Times ● Mar. 31, 2022

Now, that can stultify a pope, in which neutrality becomes an end in itself.

From Salon ● Mar. 21, 2015

But after a while Mr. Yeston’s tuneful feast begins to satiate and eventually stultify, and by the evening’s end it’s as if you’d eaten a whole buffet of pastry.

From New York Times ● Jul. 22, 2011

The reason is the feeling in jazz that if you print something, if you write down the notes, you will stultify the music.

From The Guardian ● Aug. 12, 2010

I can't stultify myself to prove this poor girl an adventuress.

From Rose MacLeod by Alice Brown

Gems include a rant on critics, the assertion that the paragraph, not the sentence, is the basic unit of writing and how writing helped alleviate his stultified misery after a near-death car accident.

From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 14, 2025

All these lessons leave me stultified; The hours in the day just drag along — I think they’ve multiplied!

From Washington Post ● Apr. 30, 2020

The stultified senators should distract themselves with dice cricket, a game beloved by indoorsy British children.

From Slate ● Jan. 23, 2020

See the opening chase scene of Bay’s “6 Underground,” currently on Netflix, for a sense of what can be done with an emotionally stultified and dramatically trivial script.

From The New Yorker ● Dec. 19, 2019

This theory represents mercy as always stultified until Christ satisfied justice.

From The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, Volume I, No. 10. October, 1880 by Aaron Walker

When I walked into the arcade, I experienced a feeling I’d stuffed down into my subconscious for decades: the stultifying awkwardness of a middle school dance.

From Slate ● Jun. 25, 2026

For Jews, the stultifying fact to be faced is that antisemitism has nothing to do with Jews.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 21, 2025

Aiding this descent is Lennert Hillege’s cinematography, coolly observant of confining darkness and stultifying daylight, not quite naturalism and not quite noir.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 10, 2025

In Lebanon, the stultifying heat of summer is overlaid by a layer of anxiety.

From BBC ● Aug. 14, 2024

Predictably, Ernest found St. Olaf a stultifying place.

From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik

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Related Words

• benumb
• deaden
• dull

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