| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. |
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| unruly |
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| SYLLABICATION: | un·ru·ly |
| PRONUNCIATION: |   n-r  l |
| ADJECTIVE: | Inflected forms: un·ru·li·er, un·ru·li·est
Difficult or impossible to discipline, control, or rule. | | ETYMOLOGY: | Middle English unreuli : un-, not; see un–1 + reuli, easy to govern (from reule, rule; see rule). | | OTHER FORMS: | un·ruli·ness —NOUN
| | SYNONYMS: | unruly, intractable, refractory, recalcitrant, headstrong, wayward These adjectives mean resistant or marked by resistance to control. Unruly implies failure to submit to rule or discipline: unruly behavior in class. Intractable and refractory refer to what is obstinate and difficult to manage or control: “the intractable ferocity of his captive” (Edgar Allan Poe, 1841 The Murders in the Rue Morgue.) “The idea of ecclesiastical authority … woke all the refractory nerves of opposition inherited from five generations of Puritans” (Harriet Beecher Stowe, Poganuc People: Their Loves and Lives 1878.) One that is recalcitrant rebels against authority: arrested the recalcitrant protestors. Headstrong describe one obstinately bent on having his or her own way: The headstrong senator ignored his constituency. One who is wayward willfully and often perversely departs from what is desired, advised, expected, or required: “a lively child, who had been spoilt and indulged, and therefore was sometimes wayward” (Charlotte Brontë).
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| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by the Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. |
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