discontent

UK/ˌdɪskənˈtɛnt/

nounC1Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #8,646 of 15,258leans written

Other forms: discontents

Discontent is a restless dissatisfaction with how things are. Growing discontent, public discontent, a winter of discontent.

It is more diffuse than anger and more dangerous to a government for that reason, since there is nothing specific to answer. The winter of discontent is Shakespeare's phrase, borrowed by British journalists for the strikes of 1978 and 1979.

Definitions of discontent

1noundiscontentA restless dissatisfaction with how things are.C1
“Rising prices and low wages have caused growing discontent among workers.”

discontent is a dissatisfaction.

Where it comes from

Latin
contentus#Etymology_2 — contained; satisfied
Middle English
contenten — to satisfy
English
content
English, today
discontent

Built from

continēre · Latin — to contain

From dis- + content. content comes from Middle English contenten (“to satisfy”), from Latin contentus#Etymology_2 (“contained; satisfied”), past participle of continēre (“to contain”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Word Building

Practise this word

discontent in the wild

Shunning can sometimes also be used by an individual to express discontent with an action of their family.
Shunning
Marganus was eldest male heir of Leir and, influenced by his peers, became discontent with ruling only half of Britain.
Marganus
Latvian rock has been an important part of Latvia's music scene since the 1980s, when it was a part of the discontent with Soviet rule.
Rock music in Latvia

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

the continēre family

content

discontent — used about once every 3,740 pages · #8,646 · point at the bar for the others

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