Demure

We need to keep changing the attitude that raises our girls to be demure, and our boys to be assertive; that criticizes our daughters for speaking out, and our sons for shedding a tear.

Marilla had almost begun to despair of ever fashioning this waif of the world into her model little girl of demure manners and prim deportment.

Mary is wearing demure clothes.

Skura's style of dress was described as demure.

I love your demure smile.

She is a demure young lady.

Nan was very much delighted in her demure way, and that delight showed itself in her face and in her clear bright eyes.

I was coming back from the ladies' room when I saw her. She looked demure. Oval wire-rimmed glasses. A sky blue jacket buttoned over a long black-and-white flowered shirt.

[H]owever hard she pushed the tough-talkin' shtick, she remained doe-eyed, glowing and somehow unassailably demure.

And in their daily lives, girls and women are pushed to conform to fairly narrow templates of behavior as demure or delicate.