1-Stop Dictionary Reference

Backbite

Acceptable For Game Play - US & UK word lists

This word is acceptable for play in the US & UK dictionaries that are being used in the following games:

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

v. To speak spitefully or slanderously about (another).

verb-intransitive. To speak spitefully or slanderously about a person.

Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

v. To make spiteful slanderous or defamatory statements about someone.

v. To attack from behind or when out of earshot.

v. To speak badly of an absent individual.

n. One who engages in backbiting; a backbiter.

the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English

v. To wound by clandestine detraction; to censure meanly or spitefully (an absent person); to slander or speak evil of (one absent).

verb-intransitive. To censure or revile the absent.

The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

To injure morally in a manner comparable to biting from behind; attack the character or reputation of secretly; censure, slander, or speak evil of in absence: rarely with a thing as object.

To slander or speak evil of the absent.

WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

v. say mean things

Word Usage

"It has just about started realizing, after much needless suffering of its own from blowback and backbite, that surviving the whirlwind of globalization takes smarts rather than brute force."

Verb Form

backbit backbites backbiting

Hypernym

Words that are more generic or abstract

sound off kick quetch complain plain kvetch

Variant

backbitten backbit

Form

backbiter backbiting

Synonym

Words with the same meaning

censure defame