"bowdlerize" meaning in English

See bowdlerize in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

IPA: /ˈbaʊd.ləˌɹaɪz/ [UK], /ˈbaʊd.ləɹˌaɪz/ [US] Audio: en-us-bowdlerize.ogg [US] Forms: bowdlerizes [present, singular, third-person], bowdlerizing [participle, present], bowdlerized [participle, past], bowdlerized [past]
Etymology: Bowdler + -ize; named after English physician Thomas Bowdler (1754–1825). In 1818, he published a censored version of William Shakespeare (The Family Shakespeare), expurgating “those words and expressions […] which cannot with propriety be read aloud in a family.” Etymology templates: {{suf|en|Bowdler|ize}} Bowdler + -ize, {{named-after/list|physician||||}} physician, {{!}} |, {{lang|en|Thomas Bowdler}} Thomas Bowdler, {{named-after|en|Thomas Bowdler|born=1754|died=1825|nat=English|nocap=1|occ=physician|wplink==}} named after English physician Thomas Bowdler (1754–1825) Head templates: {{en-verb}} bowdlerize (third-person singular simple present bowdlerizes, present participle bowdlerizing, simple past and past participle bowdlerized)
  1. To remove or alter those parts of a text considered offensive, vulgar, or otherwise unseemly. Synonyms: Bowdlerize, bowdlerise, Bowdlerise Derived forms: bowdlerism, bowdlerization, bowdlerizer Related terms: censor, expunge, expurgate, redact, sanitize Translations (to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive): censurere (Danish), censureren (Dutch), kuisen (Dutch), cenzuri (Esperanto), sensuroida (Finnish), bowdlerisoida (Finnish), censurer (French), expurger (French), zensieren (German), cenzúráz (Hungarian), meghúz (Hungarian), (to expurgate) ritskoða (Icelandic), censurare (Italian), 伏字 (fuseji) (Japanese), 伏せ字 (fuseji) (Japanese), sensurere (Norwegian Bokmål), forskjønne (Norwegian Bokmål), cenzurować [imperfective] (Polish), ocenzurować [perfective] (Polish), ugrzeczniać [imperfective] (Polish), ugrzecznić [perfective] (Polish), censurar (Portuguese), expurgar (Portuguese), цензури́ровать (cenzurírovatʹ) (Russian), вымарывать (vymaryvatʹ) (Russian), censurar (Spanish), expurgar (Spanish)
    Sense id: en-bowdlerize-en-verb-vp91xcwc Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English terms suffixed with -ize

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for bowdlerize meaning in English (7.5kB)

{
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "Bowdler",
        "3": "ize"
      },
      "expansion": "Bowdler + -ize",
      "name": "suf"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "physician",
        "2": "",
        "3": "",
        "4": "",
        "5": ""
      },
      "expansion": "physician",
      "name": "named-after/list"
    },
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "|",
      "name": "!"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "Thomas Bowdler"
      },
      "expansion": "Thomas Bowdler",
      "name": "lang"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "Thomas Bowdler",
        "born": "1754",
        "died": "1825",
        "nat": "English",
        "nocap": "1",
        "occ": "physician",
        "wplink": "="
      },
      "expansion": "named after English physician Thomas Bowdler (1754–1825)",
      "name": "named-after"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Bowdler + -ize; named after English physician Thomas Bowdler (1754–1825). In 1818, he published a censored version of William Shakespeare (The Family Shakespeare), expurgating “those words and expressions […] which cannot with propriety be read aloud in a family.”",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "bowdlerizes",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "bowdlerizing",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "bowdlerized",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "bowdlerized",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "bowdlerize (third-person singular simple present bowdlerizes, present participle bowdlerizing, simple past and past participle bowdlerized)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English terms suffixed with -ize",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "derived": [
        {
          "word": "bowdlerism"
        },
        {
          "word": "bowdlerization"
        },
        {
          "word": "bowdlerizer"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "The bowdlerized version of the novel, while free of vulgarity, was also free of flavor.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1909, H. G. Wells, chapter 1, in Ann Veronica",
          "text": "Mr. Stanley decided to treat that as irrelevant. \"There ought to be a Censorship of Books.\" . . .\nOgilvy pursued his own topic. \"I'm inclined to think, Stanley, myself that as a matter of fact it was the expurgated Romeo and Juliet did the mischief. . . . All they left it was the moon and stars. And the balcony and ‘My Romeo!’\"\n\"Shakespeare is altogether different from the modern stuff. Altogether different. I'm not discussing Shakespeare. I don't want to Bowdlerize Shakespeare.\"",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1961, J. A. Philip, “Mimesis in the Sophistês of Plato,”, in Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, volume 92, page 455",
          "text": "His critics take alarm only when it becomes apparent that he would bowdlerize Homer and exclude from his state the great tragedians.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2014 January 7, Market Chipping, “Why you should read the Madicken (Mardie) books”, in Market Chipping (blog), retrieved 2016-03-08",
          "text": "Let me tell you about Madicken. (Mardie in English. Or Meg, but that’s in the American translation and that’s bowdlerized and you should never read it.)",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To remove or alter those parts of a text considered offensive, vulgar, or otherwise unseemly."
      ],
      "id": "en-bowdlerize-en-verb-vp91xcwc",
      "links": [
        [
          "remove",
          "remove"
        ],
        [
          "alter",
          "alter"
        ],
        [
          "offensive",
          "offensive"
        ],
        [
          "vulgar",
          "vulgar"
        ],
        [
          "unseemly",
          "unseemly"
        ]
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "censor"
        },
        {
          "word": "expunge"
        },
        {
          "word": "expurgate"
        },
        {
          "word": "redact"
        },
        {
          "word": "sanitize"
        }
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "Bowdlerize"
        },
        {
          "word": "bowdlerise"
        },
        {
          "word": "Bowdlerise"
        }
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "da",
          "lang": "Danish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "censurere"
        },
        {
          "code": "nl",
          "lang": "Dutch",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "censureren"
        },
        {
          "code": "nl",
          "lang": "Dutch",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "kuisen"
        },
        {
          "code": "eo",
          "lang": "Esperanto",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "cenzuri"
        },
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "sensuroida"
        },
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "bowdlerisoida"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "censurer"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "expurger"
        },
        {
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "zensieren"
        },
        {
          "code": "hu",
          "lang": "Hungarian",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "cenzúráz"
        },
        {
          "code": "hu",
          "lang": "Hungarian",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "meghúz"
        },
        {
          "code": "is",
          "lang": "Icelandic",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "(to expurgate) ritskoða"
        },
        {
          "code": "it",
          "lang": "Italian",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "censurare"
        },
        {
          "code": "ja",
          "lang": "Japanese",
          "roman": "fuseji",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "伏字"
        },
        {
          "code": "ja",
          "lang": "Japanese",
          "roman": "fuseji",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "伏せ字"
        },
        {
          "code": "nb",
          "lang": "Norwegian Bokmål",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "sensurere"
        },
        {
          "code": "nb",
          "lang": "Norwegian Bokmål",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "forskjønne"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "tags": [
            "imperfective"
          ],
          "word": "cenzurować"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "tags": [
            "perfective"
          ],
          "word": "ocenzurować"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "tags": [
            "imperfective"
          ],
          "word": "ugrzeczniać"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "tags": [
            "perfective"
          ],
          "word": "ugrzecznić"
        },
        {
          "code": "pt",
          "lang": "Portuguese",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "censurar"
        },
        {
          "code": "pt",
          "lang": "Portuguese",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "expurgar"
        },
        {
          "code": "ru",
          "lang": "Russian",
          "roman": "cenzurírovatʹ",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "цензури́ровать"
        },
        {
          "code": "ru",
          "lang": "Russian",
          "roman": "vymaryvatʹ",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "вымарывать"
        },
        {
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "censurar"
        },
        {
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
          "word": "expurgar"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈbaʊd.ləˌɹaɪz/",
      "tags": [
        "UK"
      ]
    },
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈbaʊd.ləɹˌaɪz/",
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ]
    },
    {
      "audio": "en-us-bowdlerize.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/7/7b/En-us-bowdlerize.ogg/En-us-bowdlerize.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/En-us-bowdlerize.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (US)"
    }
  ],
  "word": "bowdlerize"
}
{
  "derived": [
    {
      "word": "bowdlerism"
    },
    {
      "word": "bowdlerization"
    },
    {
      "word": "bowdlerizer"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "Bowdler",
        "3": "ize"
      },
      "expansion": "Bowdler + -ize",
      "name": "suf"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "physician",
        "2": "",
        "3": "",
        "4": "",
        "5": ""
      },
      "expansion": "physician",
      "name": "named-after/list"
    },
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "|",
      "name": "!"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "Thomas Bowdler"
      },
      "expansion": "Thomas Bowdler",
      "name": "lang"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "Thomas Bowdler",
        "born": "1754",
        "died": "1825",
        "nat": "English",
        "nocap": "1",
        "occ": "physician",
        "wplink": "="
      },
      "expansion": "named after English physician Thomas Bowdler (1754–1825)",
      "name": "named-after"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "Bowdler + -ize; named after English physician Thomas Bowdler (1754–1825). In 1818, he published a censored version of William Shakespeare (The Family Shakespeare), expurgating “those words and expressions […] which cannot with propriety be read aloud in a family.”",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "bowdlerizes",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "bowdlerizing",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "bowdlerized",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "bowdlerized",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "bowdlerize (third-person singular simple present bowdlerizes, present participle bowdlerizing, simple past and past participle bowdlerized)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "censor"
    },
    {
      "word": "expunge"
    },
    {
      "word": "expurgate"
    },
    {
      "word": "redact"
    },
    {
      "word": "sanitize"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English 3-syllable words",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English eponyms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English terms suffixed with -ize",
        "English terms with IPA pronunciation",
        "English terms with audio links",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "English terms with usage examples",
        "English verbs",
        "Quotation templates to be cleaned"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "The bowdlerized version of the novel, while free of vulgarity, was also free of flavor.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1909, H. G. Wells, chapter 1, in Ann Veronica",
          "text": "Mr. Stanley decided to treat that as irrelevant. \"There ought to be a Censorship of Books.\" . . .\nOgilvy pursued his own topic. \"I'm inclined to think, Stanley, myself that as a matter of fact it was the expurgated Romeo and Juliet did the mischief. . . . All they left it was the moon and stars. And the balcony and ‘My Romeo!’\"\n\"Shakespeare is altogether different from the modern stuff. Altogether different. I'm not discussing Shakespeare. I don't want to Bowdlerize Shakespeare.\"",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1961, J. A. Philip, “Mimesis in the Sophistês of Plato,”, in Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association, volume 92, page 455",
          "text": "His critics take alarm only when it becomes apparent that he would bowdlerize Homer and exclude from his state the great tragedians.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2014 January 7, Market Chipping, “Why you should read the Madicken (Mardie) books”, in Market Chipping (blog), retrieved 2016-03-08",
          "text": "Let me tell you about Madicken. (Mardie in English. Or Meg, but that’s in the American translation and that’s bowdlerized and you should never read it.)",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To remove or alter those parts of a text considered offensive, vulgar, or otherwise unseemly."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "remove",
          "remove"
        ],
        [
          "alter",
          "alter"
        ],
        [
          "offensive",
          "offensive"
        ],
        [
          "vulgar",
          "vulgar"
        ],
        [
          "unseemly",
          "unseemly"
        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈbaʊd.ləˌɹaɪz/",
      "tags": [
        "UK"
      ]
    },
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈbaʊd.ləɹˌaɪz/",
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ]
    },
    {
      "audio": "en-us-bowdlerize.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/7/7b/En-us-bowdlerize.ogg/En-us-bowdlerize.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7b/En-us-bowdlerize.ogg",
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ],
      "text": "Audio (US)"
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "Bowdlerize"
    },
    {
      "word": "bowdlerise"
    },
    {
      "word": "Bowdlerise"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "da",
      "lang": "Danish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "censurere"
    },
    {
      "code": "nl",
      "lang": "Dutch",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "censureren"
    },
    {
      "code": "nl",
      "lang": "Dutch",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "kuisen"
    },
    {
      "code": "eo",
      "lang": "Esperanto",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "cenzuri"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "sensuroida"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "bowdlerisoida"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "censurer"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "expurger"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "zensieren"
    },
    {
      "code": "hu",
      "lang": "Hungarian",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "cenzúráz"
    },
    {
      "code": "hu",
      "lang": "Hungarian",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "meghúz"
    },
    {
      "code": "is",
      "lang": "Icelandic",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "(to expurgate) ritskoða"
    },
    {
      "code": "it",
      "lang": "Italian",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "censurare"
    },
    {
      "code": "ja",
      "lang": "Japanese",
      "roman": "fuseji",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "伏字"
    },
    {
      "code": "ja",
      "lang": "Japanese",
      "roman": "fuseji",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "伏せ字"
    },
    {
      "code": "nb",
      "lang": "Norwegian Bokmål",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "sensurere"
    },
    {
      "code": "nb",
      "lang": "Norwegian Bokmål",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "forskjønne"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "tags": [
        "imperfective"
      ],
      "word": "cenzurować"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "tags": [
        "perfective"
      ],
      "word": "ocenzurować"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "tags": [
        "imperfective"
      ],
      "word": "ugrzeczniać"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "tags": [
        "perfective"
      ],
      "word": "ugrzecznić"
    },
    {
      "code": "pt",
      "lang": "Portuguese",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "censurar"
    },
    {
      "code": "pt",
      "lang": "Portuguese",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "expurgar"
    },
    {
      "code": "ru",
      "lang": "Russian",
      "roman": "cenzurírovatʹ",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "цензури́ровать"
    },
    {
      "code": "ru",
      "lang": "Russian",
      "roman": "vymaryvatʹ",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "вымарывать"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "censurar"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "sense": "to remove or alter parts of a text considered offensive",
      "word": "expurgar"
    }
  ],
  "word": "bowdlerize"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-05 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.