DictionaryAI

flout

USFLOWT/flaʊt/

Verbflouts, flouting, flouted

Noun pluralflouts

Often confused with flaunt

4 meanings of flout

Practice

  1. 1
    verbtransitive
    To show contempt for a law, rule, or similar standard through what one says or does.

    Companies that flout safety regulations can face heavy fines.

    Several restaurants were openly flouting the city's ban on outdoor heaters.

    Similardefy, disregard, ignore, violate, breach

    Oppositeobey, observe, respect

    Note

    The object is nearly always a rule of some kind: regulations, laws, a ban, the rules of war. A useful contrast is the letter and the spirit, since a company can comply with the first and still flout the second. Do not confuse it with flaunt, which means to show off. The origin is uncertain; it is perhaps a Middle English verb meaning "to play the flute."

  2. 2
    nouncountable
    An act that shows contempt for a rule or law, or the violation of a law itself.

    Her sarcastic reply was a deliberate flout of the usual rules of polite conversation.

    Critics called the late-night party at the governor's mansion a flout of the curfew law.

    Similarviolation, breach, affront

    Note

    The noun has a working life in discourse analysis, where a flout is a breach of one of the maxims of conversation made deliberately and ostentatiously, so that it is meant to be noticed rather than slipped past. John Flowerdew's Discourse in English Language Education (2012) uses it this way. In that field it names a kind of move a speaker makes, not just an offense.

  3. 3
    nouncountable
    A remark or act that mocks someone; an insult.

    He endured the flouts and jeers of the crowd without a word.

    Her parting flout about his cooking stung more than he admitted.

    Similarinsult, jeer, taunt, gibe

Less common meaning

  1. 4
    verbarchaictransitive
    To regard or treat someone or something with scorn.

    Why do you flout me when I have loved you for so long?

    Three gaudy standards flout the pale blue sky.
    1812, Lord Byron, Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage
    Note

    An older use where the object is a person or thing held in scorn, not a rule. The song Izaak Walton prints in The Compleat Angler laments "Phillida flouts me," and in Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage three gaudy standards flout the pale blue sky, as if mocking it. Applied to people now, the verb sounds poetic or old-fashioned.

Practice

Can you tell the meanings of flout apart? Answer 4 quick questions from this page, or write your own sentence and AI will check it.

Origin

Perhaps from Middle English flouten ("to play the flute"); compare Dutch fluiten.