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dissuade

UK/dɪˈsweɪd/US/dɪˈsweɪd/
verbC1Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #10,387 of 15,258leans writtenformal · an editor’s judgement

Other forms: dissuaded, dissuading, dissuades

To dissuade somebody is to talk them out of doing something. Reasons, warnings, and eventually a change of mind.

It takes from and usually a verb after it: dissuade him from going, dissuade her from selling. The word is formal and it is the exact opposite of persuade, which makes the pair easy to learn together. Note that dissuading is about talk, so an obstacle does not dissuade you, it deters you. It very often appears in the negative, since nothing could dissuade him is a standard way of showing determination.

Definitions of dissuade

  1. 1verbdissuadeTo persuade someone not to do something.C1

    “We tried to dissuade her from resigning.”

Where it comes from

To dissuade is to advise the other way. Latin dis, apart, plus suādeō, to urge or to recommend: the same verb that makes persuade, pointed in reverse.

  1. Proto-Indo-European

    *sweh₂d-

  2. Latin

    dissuādeō — to urge differently”, “to advise against”, “to dissuade

  3. Middle French

    dissuader

  4. English, today

    dissuade

Built from

  • dis- · Latin — away from”, “asunder
  • suādeō · Latin — to recommend”, “to advise”, “to urge

From Middle French dissuader, from Latin dissuādeō (“to urge differently”, “to advise against”, “to dissuade”), from dis- (“away from”, “asunder”) + suādeō (“to recommend”, “to advise”, “to urge”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Sharper Verbs, A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 16 of A Man Called Ove.

Practise this word

dissuade in the wild

  • The day before meeting him in battle they were visited by their sister, Clothru, who tried in vain to dissuade them from this course of action.

    Findemna

  • Anapus was husband to the naiad Cyane, who attempted to dissuade Hades from abducting Persephone, describing how she consented to Anapus' wooing out of love, rather than force.

    Anapus

  • There is ongoing land reclamation, as evidenced by satellite imagery, despite government attempts to dissuade farmers from carrying out the activity.

    Ariake Sea

  • For example, a death threat could be used to dissuade a public figure from pursuing a criminal investigation or an advocacy campaign.

    Death threat

  • The United States government provided covert financial support to back Barrientos and to dissuade opposition parties from boycotting the vote.

    1966 Bolivian general election

1 / 2

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 suādeō family

persuasiondissuade

dissuade — used about once every 6,207 pages · #10,387 · point at the bar for the others