Word.ws English Dictionary

brownwash

brownwash verb: to rebrand, cover up or divert attention from amoral, illicit or criminal activities by establishing partnerships or connections with legitimate, value-based organizations e.g. NGOs.

Verb

brownwash (third-person singular simple present brownwashes, present participle brownwashing, simple past and past participle brownwashed)

  1. (rare) To rebrand, cover up or divert attention from amoral, illicit or criminal activities by establishing partnerships or connections with legitimate, value-based organizations e.g. NGOs.
    • Company X are brownwashing when they say they are partners with child rights NGO Y, yet employ child labor in their factories in Country Z.

Forms of brownwash

third-person singular presentbrownwashes
present participlebrownwashing
past participlebrownwashed
pastbrownwashed

Origin of brownwash

From brown (“best colour to cover up dirt”) + -wash.

Questions about brownwash

What does brownwash mean?
Brownwash means to rebrand, cover up or divert attention from amoral, illicit or criminal activities by establishing partnerships or connections with legitimate, value-based organizations e.g. NGOs.
What part of speech is brownwash?
Brownwash is a verb.
What is the past tense of brownwash?
The past tense of brownwash is brownwashed.

Words near brownwash in the dictionary

  1. brownulated
  2. Brownville
  3. Brownville Junction
  4. brownware
  5. brownwares
  6. brownwash
  7. brownwashed
  8. brownwashes
  9. brownwashing
  10. Brownwood
  11. brownwort

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: brownwash (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “brownwash.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/brownwash. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.