preaching to deaf ears
- idiom
- Informal
:
hablar a sordos
- Whenever she mentioned the risks, it was like preaching to deaf ears—no one wanted to listen.
Examples
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His concerns about safety were preaching to deaf ears at the meeting.
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She realized that bringing up environmental issues to the group was just preaching to deaf ears.
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It's like preaching to deaf ears when I try to explain my point.
-
Talking to him feels like preaching to deaf ears.
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Whenever I try to suggest improvements, it feels like preaching to deaf ears because no one pays attention.
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She found that discussing her ideas was simply preaching to deaf ears as her colleagues were not interested.
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His passionate speech about change was just preaching to deaf ears since the audience was disengaged.
Antonyms
How Receptive
- Informal
9
6.5
- Informal
1
5.5
9
3.5
- Informal
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase is compositionally transparent: 'preaching' (giving a lecture) aimed 'to deaf ears' evokes the image of speaking to listeners who cannot or will not hear, so the sense 'trying to persuade people who are unwilling or unable to listen' is directly derivable from the parts. This metaphorical mapping is common cross-linguistically and conventional in English, so a B1 learner who knows the constituent words will very likely infer the intended meaning.
Etymology
The idiom preaching to deaf ears may come from the image of someone preaching to people with deaf ears who cannot hear, so the words are wasted. That's why it means 'trying to persuade people who are unwilling or unable to listen'.