abashment
- noun
- /əˈbeɪʃmənt/
- His face turned red with abashment when he realized everyone was watching him.
Examples
-
"Banality and conventional politeness are godsends when one doesn't know what to say or do in the face of astonishment and abashment.
Academic text (2014) -
She felt a deep sense of abashment after accidentally tripping in front of her classmates.
-
When the alien did speak, it did so with a tone Calhoun hoped was abashment.
Fiction book (1998) -
With an air of abashment, Mr. Miggs went to a phone booth to call the son with whom he lived to explain his lateness.
Fiction book (1990) -
After making an embarrassing mistake, he couldn't hide his abashment during the meeting.
Synonyms
A feeling of awkwardness or shame
A feeling of shame and loss of respect for yourself after being made to look foolish
A feeling of deep shame when people treat you as unimportant
Being shy and easily embarrassed around other people
A feeling of being embarrassed and sorry after you do something wrong
Antonyms
How Embarrassed
Surface Forms
Morphology
Etymology
Abashment comes from the verb abash, which originally meant to make someone 'surprised' and 'ashamed'. Think of a person who suddenly goes quiet and blushes — that feeling is abashment, and it is the same root behind the familiar word bashful.