Word.ws English Dictionary

dismal science

dismal science noun: economics or the field of political economy.

Noun

dismal science (plural dismal sciences)

  1. (derogatory, humorous, idiomatic, sometimes, usually, with-definite-article) Economics or the field of political economy.
    • [N]ot a "gay science," but a rueful—which finds the secret of this universe in "supply and demand" . . . a dreary, desolate and, indeed, quite abject and distressing one; what we might call, by way of eminence, the dismal science.1849, Thomas Carlyle, “Occasional Discourse on the Negro Question,”, in Fraser's Magazine for Town and Country, volume 40, pages 530–531
    • Galbraith has managed to write with wit and style about the ‘dismal science’ of economics.1973, William R. Doerner, "‘Crypto Servants’ and Socialism (review of Economics and the Public Purpose by John Kenneth Galbraith)," Time, 8 Oct.

dismal science meaning in Tamil and Bengali

dismal science in Tamil

இருண்ட அறிவியல்

dismal science in Bengali

অর্থনীতি, রাজনৈতিক অর্থনীতির ক্ষেত্র

Forms of dismal science

pluraldismal sciences

Origin of dismal science

Coined by Thomas Carlyle in 1849, a play on gay science (“poetry”).

Questions about dismal science

What does dismal science mean?
Dismal science means economics or the field of political economy.
What is dismal science in Tamil?
Dismal science in Tamil is இருண்ட அறிவியல். See Dismal science meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is dismal science?
Dismal science is a noun.
What is the plural of dismal science?
The plural of dismal science is dismal sciences.

Words near dismal science in the dictionary

  1. dismal
  2. dismal Dora
  3. dismal Doras
  4. dismal Jimmies
  5. dismal Jimmy
  6. dismal science
  7. dismal sciences
  8. dismaler
  9. dismalest
  10. dismalise
  11. dismalised

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dismal science (page history and authors); dismal science (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); dismal science (Bengali 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.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-dismal science.ogg.

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