sensuous
Often confused with sensual
- 1Gratifying to the senses, often with a suggestion of physical or sensual pleasure.
The painter is known for sensuous colors and the soft, glowing skin of his figures.
The album's slow, sensuous rhythms made it a favorite for late-night dancing.
Similarsensual, voluptuous, lush, luscious
Oppositeaustere
Note
A word built from Latin sensus, "sense," with the English -ous ending, and it stays close to that root: what is sensuous is rich for the eye, the ear or the touch. Its natural subjects are colors, fabrics, rhythms and crafted things, as in a tour of Casanova's sensuous world of paintings, silk dresses, snuff boxes and silver dishes. Pleasure is part of it, but the pleasure arrives through the senses.
- 2Relating to the senses or to sensory perception.
Empiricists held that all knowledge begins in sensuous experience.
The philosopher contrasted the sensuous appearance of things with the reality he believed lay beneath it.
Similarsensory
Oppositeintellectual, spiritual
Note
The neutral use: it names whatever reaches us through the senses, with none of the pleasure in the richer meaning. It belongs to philosophy and criticism, where sensuous appearance or sensuous experience is set against what lies behind it, and it takes no more or most. In everyday prose sensory says the same thing without the risk of being misread.
Practice
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Origin
Formed from Latin sensus ("sense") and the English suffix -ous.