Word.ws English Dictionary

sportswash

sportswash verb: to use sporting events to improve a polity's reputation, especially to distract from human rights abuses.

Verb

sportswash (third-person singular simple present sportswashes, present participle sportswashing, simple past and past participle sportswashed)

  1. To use sporting events to improve a polity's reputation, especially to distract from human rights abuses.
    • Asked how he would feel if the event was part of a move to "sportswash" over wrongdoing, he said: "If that was the case I would definitely have to say I would be bothered – but my only focus is the boxing."2019, “Joshua v Ruiz II: Anthony Joshua responds to 'sportswashing' Saudi human rights claims”, in BBC

Noun

sportswash (plural sportswashes)

  1. An incidence of sportswashing

Forms of sportswash

Verb
third-person singular presentsportswashes
present participlesportswashing
past participlesportswashed
pastsportswashed
Noun
pluralsportswashes

Origin of sportswash

From sports + -wash.

Questions about sportswash

What does sportswash mean?
Sportswash means to use sporting events to improve a polity's reputation, especially to distract from human rights abuses.
What part of speech is sportswash?
Sportswash can be a verb or a noun.
What is the past tense of sportswash?
The past tense of sportswash is sportswashed.

Words near sportswash in the dictionary

  1. sportspersonship
  2. sportsplex
  3. sportsplexes
  4. sportster
  5. sportsters
  6. sportswash
  7. sportswashed
  8. sportswashes
  9. sportswashing
  10. sportswatching
  11. sportswear

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sportswash (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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