humiliate
- 01 B2 Upper Intermediate
to make someone feel ashamed or stupid, often by pointing out their mistakes in public.
to injure the dignity and self-respect of another person, typically by public exposure of a perceived flaw or failure.
Simple“He didn't mean to humiliate her by correcting her grammar in front of the whole class.”
In context“The manager's decision to reprimand the employee in the middle of the open-plan office served only to humiliate him and damage team morale.”
UsageThis is a transitive verb that requires a direct object, usually a person or a group.
- 02 B2 Upper Intermediate
to beat an opponent by a very large score so they feel embarrassed.
to defeat an opponent overwhelmingly or decisively in a competitive setting.
Simple“The home team humiliated their rivals with a final score of seven to zero.”
In context“The defending champions were humiliated in the opening round, suffering a loss so total that analysts questioned their future viability.”
UsageCommonly used in sports journalism to describe a one-sided victory.
Borrowed from Late Latin humiliātus, perfect passive participle of humiliō (“to abase, humble”) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), from Latin humilis (“lowly, humble”), from humus (“ground; earth, soil”); see humble.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.