oppress
Syllables: op·press/əˈpɹɛs/
oppress verb: to keep down by unjust force.
Verb
oppress (third-person singular simple present oppresses, present participle oppressing, simple past and past participle oppressed)
- To keep down by unjust force.
- The rural poor were oppressed by the land-owners.
- To make sad or gloomy.
- We were oppressed by the constant grey skies.
- Synonyms:
- begloom, get down, aggrieve, attrist, begrieve, besorrow, grieve, pain, bring down, come down on
- Physically to press down on (someone) with harmful effects; to smother, crush.
- Most mercilesse of women, VVyden hight, / Her other sonne fast sleeping did oppresse, / And with most cruell hand him murdred pittilesse.1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC
- To sexually violate; to rape.
Noun
oppress (countable and uncountable, plural oppresses)
oppress meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
oppress in Hindi
- keep down by unjust force
- दमन daman
oppress in Tamil
- தடை, தண்டனை முதலியன மூலம் கொடுமைப்படுத்து, கொடுங்கோலாட்சி புரி, அடக்கு, அமுக்கு, அழுத்து
oppress in Marathi
- keep down by unjust force
- दडपून ठेवणे daḍpūn ṭhevṇe, दडपणे daḍapṇe, दडपशाही करणे daḍapśāhī karṇe
oppress in Urdu
- to oppress, persecute
- ستانا satānā
More languagesFewer languages
- oppress in Bengali
- নির্যাতন করা, অত্যাচার করা, দমন করা
- oppress in Malayalam
- ഞെരുക്കുക ñerukkuka
- oppress in Kannada
- ಅದುಮು, ತುಳಿ, ದಮನಮಾಡು, ತಲೆಯೆತ್ತದಂತೆ ಮಾಡು
- oppress in Odia
- ସାଧିବା sādhibā
- oppress in Sanskrit
- बाध् bādh, रुध् rudh
- oppress in Pashto
- غضب کول
- oppress in Tagalog
- mang-api, apihin
- oppress in Arabic
- اِسْتَضْعَفَ istaḍʕafa, قَهَرَ qahara, اِضْطَهَدَ iḍṭahada
- oppress in Thai
- กดขี่ gòt-kìi, ข่มขี่
- oppress in Vietnamese
- áp chế
Examples of oppress in a sentence
- Kyriarchy concerns structural power and refers to social systems that dominate and oppress.
- I'd rather make it impossible for him to act in ways that oppress me.
- All we have to do is kill the mad-dog Nicaraguan who oppresses our people, calling himself a soldier.
Synonyms of oppress
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Forms of oppress
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | oppresses |
| present participle | oppressing |
| past participle | oppressed |
| past | oppressed |
| second-person singular present (archaic) | oppressest |
| second-person singular past (archaic) | oppressedst |
| third-person singular present (archaic) | oppresseth |
| Noun | |
| plural | oppresses |
Origin of oppress
From Middle English oppressen, from Old French oppresser, from Medieval Latin oppressare (“to press against, oppress”), frequentative of Latin opprimere, past participle oppressus (“to press against, press together, oppress”), from ob (“against”) + premere, past participle pressus (“to press”); see press.
Words formed from oppress
Words that rhyme with oppress
48 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- SMS
- success
- compress
- largesse
- ness
- profess
- confess
- distress
- regress
- depress
- excess
- guess
- prepossess
- undress
- CBS
- ingress
- redress
- transgress
- assess
- cess
- duress
- fess
- fluoresce
- Hesse
- less
- mayoress
- obsess
- tress
- unless
- yes
- accresce
- acquiesce
- aggress
- BESS
- caress
- clothes press
- congress
- defervesce
- digress
- ess
- foulness
- Hess
- intumesce
- jess
- lazy S
- liquesce
- repress
- second-guess
Questions about oppress
- What does oppress mean?
- Oppress means to keep down by unjust force.
- What is oppress in Hindi?
- Oppress in Hindi is दमन (daman). See Oppress meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is oppress?
- Oppress can be a verb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce oppress?
- Oppress is pronounced /əˈpɹɛs/.
- What is the past tense of oppress?
- The past tense of oppress is oppressed.
Words near oppress in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: oppress (page history and authors); oppress (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ستانا (Urdu) (page history and authors); oppress (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ഞെരുക്കുക (Malayalam) (page history and authors); oppress (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ସାଧିବା (Odia) (page history and authors); बाध् (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); غضب کول (Pashto) (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-oppress.wav.
Cite this entry: “oppress.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/oppress. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.