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Oppress vs Deject - What's the difference?

oppress | deject |

In transitive terms the difference between oppress and deject

is that oppress is to make sad or gloomy while deject is make sad or dispirited.

As verbs the difference between oppress and deject

is that oppress is physically to press down on (someone) with harmful effects; to smother, crush while deject is make sad or dispirited.

oppress

English

Verb

(es)
  • (obsolete) Physically to press down on (someone) with harmful effects; to smother, crush.
  • * , II.x:
  • Most mercilesse of women, VVyden hight, / Her other sonne fast sleeping did oppresse , / And with most cruell hand him murdred pittilesse.
  • To keep down by force
  • The rural poor were oppressed by the land-owners.
  • To make sad or gloomy
  • We were oppressed by the constant grey skies.

    deject

    English

    Verb

  • Make sad or dispirited.
  • * Benjamin Franklin
  • I pitied poor Miss Read's unfortunate situation. She was generally dejected , seldom cheerful, and avoided company.
  • (obsolete) To cast down.
  • * Udall
  • Christ dejected himself even unto the hells.
  • * Fuller
  • Sometimes she dejects her eyes in a seeming civility; and many mistake in her a cunning for a modest look.

    Quotations

    * 1927 Harold Victor Routh: God, Man, & Epic Poetry: A Study in Comparative Literature [http://books.google.com/books?vid=OCLC03459385&id=fx8LAAAAMAAJ&q=dejects&dq=dejects&pgis=1] (page 215) *: Vergil succeeds in filling Hades with all that depresses and dejects in his world, so that Aeneas encounters the causes of Augustan pessimism. * 1933 Arthur Melville Jordan: Educational Psychology (page 60) [http://books.google.com/books?vid=OCLC00764755&id=U6cQm3IcVHcC&q=%22there+is+nothing+which+dejects+school+children+quite+so+%22&dq=%22there+is+nothing+which+dejects+school+children+quite+so+%22&pgis=1] *: On the other hand, there is nothing which dejects school children quite so much as failure.

    Derived terms

    * dejected * dejection