Dumbness

noun, slang

noun, slang ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The state of being mute: that is, of not communicating vocally, whether from selective mutism (refusal to speak) or from an inability to speak. dated, offensive, uncountable, usually

    "He was a deaf-mute. His dumbness did not seem to matter when we were boys."

  2. 2
    the quality of being mentally slow and limited wordnet
  3. 3
    Muteness, silence; abstention from speech. dated, uncountable, usually

    "There was speech in their dumbness."

  4. 4
    Show or gesture without words; pantomime; dumb-show. dated, uncountable, usually

    "To the dumbness of the gesture one might interpret."

  5. 5
    The quality of being stupid or foolish. informal, uncountable, usually

Synonyms

All synonyms
densenessanaudiaaphasiaaphoniaasininityblockishness

Example

More examples

"My culture does not equate sexuality with dumbness."

Etymology

From Middle English dombenesse, from Old English dumbnes; equivalent to dumb + -ness. Cognate with Old Frisian dumbnisse (“folly, dumbness”).

Related phrases

artificial dumbnessdumb showselective mutism

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.