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unlearn

American

[uhn-lurn] / ʌnˈlɜrn /

verb (used with object)

to forget or lose knowledge of.
to discard or put aside certain knowledge as being false or binding.

to unlearn preconceptions.

verb (used without object)

to lose or discard knowledge.

unlearn British

/ ʌnˈlɜːn /

verb

to try to forget (something learnt) or to discard (accumulated knowledge)

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

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Etymology

Origin of unlearn

First recorded in 1400–50, unlearn is from the late Middle English word unlernen. See un- ², learn

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:

unlearn unlearns unlearned unlearnt unlearning

You don't unlearn how to drive, and you don't become a miracle wonder driver.

From BBC ● Jun. 7, 2026

I had to unlearn the muscle memory of taking people to a poignant place and then relieving that tension with a punch line.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 25, 2025

As I've grown, I have been actively working to unlearn this inherited behavior.

From Salon ● Nov. 6, 2024

He is still seeking the outer boundaries of his instrument, while everyone else was trying, in some sense, to unlearn that knowledge.

From New York Times ● Feb. 2, 2024

He evaluated my game this way: I had potential to become a decent player provided I was prepared to work hard to unlearn the numerous bad habits I had taught myself.

From "Kaffir Boy: An Autobiography" by Mark Mathabane

Not all that trial's lore unlearns Of all the lies that life betrays, Avails, for still desire returns— The last day's folly is to-day's.

From The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume I. The Songs of Scotland of the past half century by Charles Rogers

One peculiar mark of the youth, and even of the whole life of Augustin, is the ease with which he unlearns and breaks off his habits—the sentimental as well as the intellectual.

From Saint Augustin by Vincent O'Sullivan

He unlearns all his useless modesty, and turns little by little into the “man” or the “graybeard” of Hartmann.

From Thoughts Out of Season (Part II) by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Once the rock-portal is passed, it unlearns all its sprightly grace and trickles disconsolately through the sands, expiring, at last, in the dreary Chott el Rharsa.

From Fountains in the Sand Rambles Among the Oases of Tunisia by Norman Douglas

It is when we come to the modern plays that we find the poet falling back upon conventional and somewhat clumsy methods of exposition, which he only by degrees, though by rapid degrees, unlearns.

From Play-Making A Manual of Craftsmanship by William Archer

Mr. Vance has no ill words for the unlearned fundamentalism in which his grandmother raised him.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 15, 2026

The South African National Biodiversity Institute, which runs the zoo, denied it, saying it was behaviour learnt from years of circus life that would never be completely unlearned.

From BBC ● Aug. 21, 2024

“Artists should have unlearned having one platform being their main vehicle,” Flanagan said.

From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 10, 2024

But what we’ve witnessed in these bank runs and collapses is a sign that the lessons of that historic event are still unlearned.

From Seattle Times ● May 5, 2023

Lelia says there are certain mental pathways of speaking that can never be unlearned.

From "Native Speaker" by Chang-rae Lee

Despite these changes, some lessons remained unlearnt for years after 9/11.

From BBC ● Sep. 10, 2026

"The Fukushima accident is the result of unlearnt lessons of Chernobyl," Rosatom spokesman Sergei Novikov said.

From Reuters ● Apr. 18, 2011

And a hundred lessons on farming had to be learnt, and a hundred more to be unlearnt.

From Modern Skepticism: A Journey Through the Land of Doubt and Back Again A Life Story by Joseph Barker

But the love-ways that came so easy to him were lessons all unlearnt as yet by her, and he respected both her reticence and her reluctance.

From Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Volume 17, No. 101, May, 1876 by Various

In fact, the prudential morality, based on motives of health and reputation and success, is a thing that has often to be deliberately unlearnt at a later stage.

From The Child of the Dawn by Arthur Christopher Benson

When attackers retrained models on dangerous knowledge, capabilities removed by conventional unlearning sprang back to nearly full strength.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 26, 2026

"The first step to unlearning something is understanding where it is actually happening in the brain," Riesenhuber said.

From Science Daily ● Jul. 12, 2026

Critics and audiences were done with Deen, refusing to look critically at her defense, which was that she grew up in the 1960s at the start of Southern integration, and that unlearning language took time.

From Salon ● Sep. 7, 2025

He does his own unlearning of anthropocentrism on the page through his intense experiences with these three rivers, concluding only when the rivers are done with him: “I am rivered.”

From Los Angeles Times ● May 15, 2025

“Yes. I see that....Well, I thank you, Genry. But my business is unlearning, not learning. And I’d rather not yet learn an art that would change the world entirely.”

From "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023