flaunt
Formsflaunts, flaunting, flaunted
Often confused with flout
Formsflaunts, flaunting, flaunted
Pluralflaunts
- 1To display something in a showy way, so as to draw attention to it.
The new owners flaunt their money with a row of sports cars parked on the lawn.
During the parade, the army flaunted its latest missiles before the foreign press.
Similarparade, display, brandish, exhibit
Note
The word came into English from the north, perhaps akin to Norwegian flanta, "to show off, wander about", and it has always carried a hint of disapproval. People flaunt wealth, designer clothes, an ability or a power, usually in front of someone meant to notice. A writer can add "even" for emphasis, as in shown, flaunted even, to mark the step from plain display to boasting.
- 2To flout something such as a rule or custom, openly ignoring or defying it.
Critics say the company is flaunting the rules by running ads the regulator already banned.
Drivers who flaunt the speed limit near the school will be ticketed, the police chief warned.
Similarflout, defy, ignore, disregard
Note
The rule-breaking meaning comes from confusing flaunt with flout, and careful writers still count it as a mistake. Strictly, to flaunt a rule would be to show it off; to defy it is to flout it. The mix-up turns up in print, even in news reporting about regulators, but in careful writing say flout.
- 3To make a showy display of oneself, for example in flashy clothes.
Every Sunday the mayor's sons flaunt about the town square in their new coats.
One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade.
1733, [Alexander Pope], An Essay on Man.Note
The older use needs no object: people simply flaunt, usually in something (rags, brocade, the latest French fashions) or about a place. Pope sets the two poles side by side in An Essay on Man: "One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade." Present-day English usually gives the verb an object, as in flaunting one's wealth, so the bare form now reads as literary.
Less common meanings
- 4To wave or flutter in the wind with a brisk, smart movement.
Flags of every color flaunt above the harbor on race day.
Flaunt away, flags of all nations! be duly lower’d at sunset!
1892, Walt Whitman, “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry”Note
A poet's way of making a flag, a loose sheet or a flowering plant seem to show itself off in the wind. Whitman cries "Flaunt away, flags of all nations!" in Crossing Brooklyn Ferry, and Faulkner still lets an orchard flaunt in Sanctuary (1931). The use is archaic and takes no object; in everyday writing, flags simply wave or flutter.
- 5Anything displayed for show, such as fine clothes worn to impress.
Should I , in these my borrow'd flaunts, behold The sternness of his presence?
c. 1610, William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”Note
The noun names the showy thing itself rather than the act of showing it off. In The Winter's Tale, Shakespeare has a character speak of "my borrow'd flaunts", finery that is not truly the wearer's own. The noun has died out, and the word survives only as the verb of showing off.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origins
Of North Germanic origin, perhaps related to Norwegian flanta ("to show off, wander about"), Icelandic flana ("to rush about, act rashly") and French flâner ("to wander around, loiter"). Alternatively it may be related to Swedish flankt ("loosely, flutteringly"), from flanka ("to waver, hang and wave about"), a variant of flakka ("to waver"), which is related to Middle English flacken ("to move to and fro, flutter").
This use arose through confusion with flout.