Word.ws English Dictionary

deafness

/ˈdɛfnəs/

deafness noun: the condition of being deaf; the lack or loss of the ability to hear.

Noun

deafness (countable and uncountable, plural deafnesses)

  1. The condition of being deaf; the lack or loss of the ability to hear.
    • Paul wet his lips with his tongue, read: “ ‘Think you of I the fact that a deaf person cannot hear. Then, what deafness may we not all possess? What senses do we lack that we cannot see and cannot hear another world all around us? What is there around us that we cannot—’ ”1965 October 1, Frank Herbert, “Book I: Dune”, in Dune, Philadelphia, Pa.: Chilton Book Company; [Toronto], Ont.: Thomas Nelson & Sons, →OCLC, page 40
  2. (figuratively) Lack of knowledge or refusal to admit a particular problem, issue, etc.
    • their deafness to her cries

deafness meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Telugu

deafness in Hindi

condition of being deaf
बहरापन bahrāpan, बधिरता badhirtā

deafness in Tamil

condition of being deaf
செவிடு ceviṭu

deafness in Urdu

بہرا پن

deafness in Telugu

condition of being deaf
చెవుడు cevuḍu, చెవిటితనం ceviṭitanaṁ
More languagesFewer languages
deafness in Kannada
ಕಿವುಡುತನ, ಕಿವುಡಿಕೆ
deafness in Arabic
صَمَم ṣamam
deafness in Malay
kepekakan, ketulian
deafness in Persian
ناشنوایی nâšenavâyi

Examples of deafness in a sentence

  • The condition may be associated with neurosensorial deafness 1 and is probably caused by changes in the internal hair sheath.
  • They are disappointed, incredulous at humanity’s deafness.
  • Systemic symptoms include headache, anorexia and sometimes nausea, vomiting, tinnitus and deafness, and deplumation or bleaching of the hair may occur.

All 12 example sentences with deafness

Forms of deafness

pluraldeafnesses

Origin of deafness

From Middle English deefnesse; equivalent to deaf + -ness.

Words formed from deafness

Phrases with deafness

Questions about deafness

What does deafness mean?
Deafness means the condition of being deaf; the lack or loss of the ability to hear.
What is deafness in Hindi?
Deafness in Hindi is बहरापन (bahrāpan), बधिरता (badhirtā). See Deafness meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is deafness?
Deafness is a noun.
How do you pronounce deafness?
Deafness is pronounced /ˈdɛfnəs/ (UK).
What is the plural of deafness?
The plural of deafness is deafnesses.

Words near deafness in the dictionary

  1. Deaflympics
  2. deafmute
  3. deafmutes
  4. deafmutism
  5. deafmutisms
  6. deafness
  7. deafnesses
  8. deafo
  9. deafos
  10. deafs
  11. deage

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: deafness (page history and authors); deafness (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); deafness (Kannada Wiktionary) (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-deafness.wav.

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