are you deaf

9.5

A rude question you ask when someone is not listening

idiom

Slur

: [Ofensivo] ¿eres sordo?

After repeating himself several times, he finally snapped, 'Are you deaf or something?'

Examples

I can't believe you missed that! Are you deaf?
It's rude to shout 'are you deaf' at someone just because they didn't hear you the first time.
She waved her hand in front of his face and said, 'Are you deaf?' when he ignored her instructions.
He just ignored my question. Are you deaf or what?
After repeating himself several times, he finally snapped, 'Are you deaf or something?'
It's rude to shout 'are you deaf' at someone just because they didn't hear you the first time.
She waved her hand in front of his face and said, 'Are you deaf?' when he ignored her instructions.

Antonyms

attention

∞ 1.6

A careful focus on something to notice or think about it

Surface Forms

are you deaf main

Morphology

be + you + deaf

The accusatory meaning 'you are not listening' is directly derived from the literal components: the auxiliary 'are' + 'you' + the adjective 'deaf' (unable/unwilling to hear). This figurative extension is cross-linguistically common and follows a straightforward compositional pattern, so a B1 learner who knows the parts will generally infer the intended non-literal meaning (context/tone may affect register but not the basic interpretation).

Etymology

Are you deaf comes from the plain, literal question about hearing and points to deaf, 'cannot hear', when someone does not reply. People say it angrily to mean 'are you not listening' or 'are you not paying attention', so today it shows someone ignored what was said.