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单词 mute
释义

mute1

/mjuːt /
adjective
1Refraining from speech or temporarily speechless: Harry sat mute, his cheeks burning resentfully...
  • Police officers remained mute spectators as pedestrians, bikers, car drivers, autodrivers and other road users waited out the jams under a bright January sun.
  • The director appears in the last shot of all the stories, a mute spectator who is a symbol of society, which is portrayed as having become insensitive to everything.
  • In both the cases, the public remained mute spectators.

Synonyms

silent, speechless, dumb, unspeaking, wordless, voiceless, tongue-tied, at a loss for words, tight-lipped, close-mouthed, taciturn, uncommunicative
informal mum
archaic mumchance
1.1Not expressed in speech: she gazed at him in mute appeal...
  • In the ground floor restaurants, every meal attracts a crowd of kids who press their faces against the glass in a mute appeal for food.
  • Mrs. Willis rolled her eyes toward Heaven in a mute appeal for help, while Adam laughed, put down a bag, and pushed the door open.
  • He crumbles before the mute appeal in his fellow musician's eye: ‘It felt like kicking a spaniel.’

Synonyms

wordless, silent, dumb, tacit, unspoken, inarticulate, unvoiced, unsaid, unexpressed, unuttered
1.2Characterized by an absence of sound; quiet: the great church was mute and dark...
  • We are not here to consider the appeal of mute ruins, the hollowness of reason, the veneer of American order.
  • He didn't bother lifting his hand to search the extensive marble wall for the light switch as he removed his boots and his bare feet dragged slowly into the massive mute darkness before him.
  • Above him, attached to the wall, were 25 manual typewriters with rusted and missing parts, mute relics of an antiquated era in communication.

Synonyms

quiet, silent, noiseless, soundless, hushed
1.3(Of hounds) not giving tongue while hunting.
2 dated or offensive (Of a person) lacking the faculty of speech: he’d been bullied into silence—people often wondered if he was actually mute...
  • The mute boy on the back of Zach's bike is one of a group of disabled children looked after at a place called The Lake, a large rambling house in 40 acres of ground, owned by an eccentric called Anna.
  • McBride selects four of these soldiers and deposits them behind enemy lines, with a small and apparently mute child to take care of.
  • Set in the 19th century the book is the story of a mute child who has been living alone in the woods of Southern France.

Synonyms

dumb, unable to speak
technical aphasic, aphonic
3(Of a letter) not pronounced: mute e is generally dropped before suffixes beginning with a vowel
noun
1 dated or offensive A person lacking the faculty of speech: the child remained as silent as a mute...
  • They do not write; and unlike mutes, or monks under vows of silence, they do not use any signs or other devices in place of speaking.
  • Assuming you aren't a mute, what will we talk about on our date?
  • At one point it was believed she was incapable of speech and nearly labeled a mute.
1.1 historical (In some Asian countries) a servant who was deprived of the power of speech.
1.2 historical An actor in a dumbshow.
1.3 historical A professional attendant or mourner at a funeral: an undertaker’s mute...
  • He had a deep-seated loathing of the panoply of the Victorian funeral: mummers, mutes, plumes, palls, and all.
2A clamp placed over the bridge of a stringed instrument to deaden the resonance without affecting the vibration of the strings.
2.1A pad or cone placed in the opening of a brass or other wind instrument to soften the sound.He said there was the possibility that the disappearance of the items, which also included four red and blue glitter hats, several brass mutes and three wooden music rests, was a mistake....
  • The cash paid for music, a PA system and mutes for the brass section.
  • On woodwinds, a cloth bag has sometimes been tied over the instrument, and small pear-shaped wooden mutes were made to fit into 18th-century oboe bells.
3A device on a television, telephone, or other appliance that temporarily turns off the sound.He then quietly crept downstairs to get himself a drink, consciousness now having taken a hold on him, and then he flicked around the television channels on mute until his parents woke up....
  • The twenty-three year old man was going through photos, the television on mute as he picked up a magazine.
  • Aimée nodded absently and sat down beside her friend just as she heard the front door open, but ignored it and took the mute off the television.
verb [with object]
1Deaden, muffle, or soften the sound of: her footsteps were muted by the thick carpet...
  • Sounds are muted with dull explosions and gunfire, and the music is very dreary.
  • ‘The thick curtains also help mute the sound of our son's rock band rehearsals,’ says Hertz.
  • The third can at least be muted by some dampening, and by putting sufficient thought into case design and component layout to minimise sympathetic vibrations.

Synonyms

deaden, muffle, mask, dull, dampen, damp down, soften, quieten, silence;
stifle, smother, suppress, lower, reduce, diminish, decrease
1.1Muffle the sound of (a musical instrument), especially by the use of a mute: when muted and blown hard the trombone produces a very nasal and metallic sound...
  • Use a keyboard which has shortcut keys for instantly muting the sound though.
  • To keep the drums from becoming overpowering onstage and in the mix, they were muted with a set of SoundOff drum set silencers.
  • The guitarists spend much of the show muting their strings and one of them actually sits out on a few songs, sparing the music of any clutter.
1.2Reduce the strength or intensity of: police violence was always muted by the presence of the media...
  • By using blue filters that mute the intensity of bright colors, he gives his film a stark, wintry feel.
  • It is too early to tell if such aggressive measures will mute the violence or stoke it.
  • Surprisingly Jack was a subtle presence; muting her usual impact and actually helping them do their jobs.

Synonyms

restrain, soften, subdue, tone down, make less intense, moderate, temper, soft-pedal

Usage

1 To describe a person without the power of speech as mute (especially as in deaf mute) is today likely to cause offence and the term is often regarded as outdated. Nevertheless, there is no directly equivalent term for mute in general use, apart from speech-impaired. Profoundly deaf may be used to imply that a person has not developed any spoken language skills. 2 Note that a question subject to debate or dispute is a moot point, not a mute point. See moot (usage).

Derivatives

mutely

/ˈmjuːtli / adverb ...
  • I mutely watched as a silent battle of wills raged between the two, glad for once I wasn't a part of it.
  • We both nodded mutely and silently returned to the den to talk it over with each other.
  • The girl continued to gaze back at him mutely, expressing no reaction.

muteness

/ˈmjuːtnəs / noun ...
  • My unusual muteness must have made him wonder if I was having second thoughts.
  • Pardon, I am traveling with a girl that had been cursed by muteness.
  • He had suddenly developed selective muteness in school for days or even a whole week at a time on five different documented occasions since the previous October.

Origin

Middle English: from Old French muet, diminutive of mu, from Latin mutus.

Rhymes

mute2

/mjuːt /
noun archaic
A pack of hounds: the abbot had a mute of hounds...
  • He ordered them to stay the proceedings for the recovery of a horse with a saddle and bridle, a hat, a cloak, a ring, a cup, and a mute of hounds.
  • Wellington's modest mute of hounds accompanied their owner on his journey.
  • This mute of hounds, dashing all over the pace, split the morning air with enough hideous din to frighten any fox out of the commune.

Origin

Late Middle English: from Anglo-Norman mut, mute, moute 'pack of hounds trained for hunting', from Latin movere 'to move'.

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更新时间:2024/9/21 17:49:42