rebarbative
1
9.9
- adjective
- /ˌriːˈbɑːrbətɪv/
- Formal
- Her rebarbative attitude made it difficult for her to make friends.
Examples
-
Most people found the article's rebarbative tone off-putting and uninviting.
-
A situation of that sort is not a moral conflict; the only relevant moral duty is a duty to abstain from the rebarbative policy.
Academic text (2018) -
I mean no aspersion: the lines have their perfect beauty in other registers, and Whitman is, of course, no rebarbative writer, as Thoreau, at times, can be.
Blog text (6) -
I wanted to put together the rebarbative geography and the emollient verse, so I went down from Athens to spend a week in Keats's "dales of Arcady."
Academic text (1998) -
Furthermore, the notion of dirty hands is not applicable to a situation in which the rebarbative aspects and the ostensibly benign aspects of some policy are constitutively indissociable.
Academic text (2018) -
A second reason put forward for the marginalization of CARL is the rebarbative presentation of its research; this is a particular concern of Potter's ("Literary Criticism" 91, 94, 97), but others have echoed her.
Academic text (1995) -
It is thus one of the few literary journals that has effectively resisted the rebarbative jargon and conceptual fatuities of poststructuralism but has also remained alive to new currents of thought and information flowing in from empirically responsible sources.
Academic text (2002) -
The rebarbative comments he made during the meeting turned everyone against him.
Synonyms
156
5.1
Very ugly and likely to make people feel shocked or disgusted
54
5.5
Causing strong dislike or disgust, like a very bad smell
43
4.3
Not wanted and causing upset or trouble
42
1.8
Not pleasant to look at or to the senses
34
4.6
Something that makes people feel dislike or disgust
31
4.9
Very unpleasant and likely to make you feel disgusted
29
4.6
Not wanted because it is unpleasant, harmful, or causes problems
25
7.5
So unpleasant you cannot stand it
19
7.7
Causing strong disgust or hatred in people
15
5.0
Unfriendly in manner so people feel uncomfortable
15
4.1
Not attractive, pleasant, or interesting
15
4.5
Unpleasant to look at
10
6.1
Causing strong dislike or disgust
9
6.5
Very unpleasant and causing people to feel strong dislike or hate
4
4.1
Appearing very fat in an unattractive way
3
5.3
Having a bad smell or taste that bothers you
1
8.4
Making people or animals avoid something because it is unpleasant
1
6.4
Causing strong dislike or disgust
1
6.9
Making people feel strong dislike or disgust
1
8.4
So bad or strong that you cannot stand it
1
6.7
Causing a strong feeling of dislike or making people feel sick
Antonyms
How Unpleasant
Surface Forms
Etymology
Rebarbative is easy to remember if you think of re- 'back' and barb 'sharp point', like something that pushes you back with little barbs. So, rebarbative describes a person or thing that is unpleasant and likely to repel others.