Word of the Day

opprobrium \uh-PRO-bree-uhm\, noun:

1. Disgrace; infamy; reproach mingled with contempt.
2. A cause or object of reproach or disgrace.

Typically academic, they disdainfully observed about many university press books--"too dry, too specialized, too self-absorbed for us." In their world, the word "academic" was as much a term of opprobrium as the word "middlebrow" was in mine.
-- Janice A. Radway, A Feeling for Books

Five months after Malaysia incurred global opprobrium by closing off its currency and capital markets, its officials are in no mood to apologize.
-- Mark Landler, "Malaysia Says Its Much-Criticized Financial Strategy Has Worked", New York Times, February 14, 1999


Opprobrium derives from Latin opprobrare, "to reproach," from ob, "in the way of" + probrum, "reproach." The adjective form is opprobrious.