Defiance is open refusal to obey. Not sneaking round a rule — standing in front of it and saying no.
The openness is the whole point, which is why the word suits protesters, teenagers and strikers equally well. It takes in: in defiance of the ban, in defiance of a court order, and that phrase is where the word mostly lives. The adjective defiant describes the look as much as the act, as in a defiant stare. The verb defy means both to refuse to obey and to be impossible to do, which is how a view can defy description.
1noundefianceOpen refusal to obey an authority or a rule.
“She stayed put, in open defiance of the order.”
Proto-Indo-European
*bʰeydʰ-
Old French
desfiance
Middle English
defiaunce
English, today
defiance
From Middle English defiaunce, from Old French desfiance, from desfier. by surface analysis, defy + -ance.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA