Meaning of diminutize | Babel Free

Definitions

1. To put (a word, name) in a diminutive form.
2. To make (someone or something) appear smaller (often in a figurative sense).

Examples

“[…] her name⟳ is Concepcion, diminutized: Concha […]”

“[…] Marie Antoinette is referred to in the literature of the Revolution as the “Widow Capet”—a title containing no name⟳ of her own⟳ or any she herself had ever used. Elsewhere her given name⟳ is diminutized as “Toinon” and “Toinette.””

“2007, Bruce Donaldson, German: An Essential Grammar, London: Routledge, Section 6.3, p. 41, All diminutized nouns, whatever their original gender, become⟳ neuter once they take⟳ either of [the] endings [-chen or -lein].”

“You must remember⟳ that it takes two to make⟳ a bargain. On your side you look⟳ through a telescope so that it will magnify the value of your holdings, while the buyer, on the contrary, looks through the reverse end⟳ of the instrument so as to diminutize it as much as possible.”

“1986, Jim Godbolt, All This and Many a Dog, London: Northway, revised edition, 2007, Part Two, Chapter 2, p. 140, The lady owner came out of the store, snatched the ticket from the windscreen, flung it to the ground and screamed: ‘You silly little man!’ at the warden, who was completing his entry of the offence in his book. He was of average height, but the rich invariably diminutize those who upset⟳ them.”

“[He] was a small wizened man whose face⟳ was diminutized by a large flat-brimmed black stetson.”

“From that evening on—Christ, her father was a Nobel laureate and dead to boot—I could not look⟳ in the mirror without seeing a hamster […] Her billions diminutized me. I was a kept man. A gigolo. A rodent.”

“2016, Miranda July, quoted in Diana Wichtel, “The July Plot,” New Zealand Listener, 23 January, 2016, p. 34, I think⟳ the quirky thing is often not used in a positive way. It is, as we know⟳, a belittling kind of word. A man might be called ground-breaking or genius or something. Quirky is a diminutising way to say⟳ that.”

CEFR level