Make Your Point > Archived Issues > DUMBFOUND

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pronounce DUMBFOUND: Say it "dum FOUND." Or, "DUM found." To hear it, click here. connect this word to others: Let's talk about all the ways we can be rendered senseless. And powerless! If we suddenly can't see, hear, smell, feel, or taste, either literally or figuratively, then, respectively, we've been blinded, deafened, anosmicized,* benumbed (or a___thetized), or ageusized.* Hang on, we need a table.   When suddenly we can't...       we've been...   see   blinded.   hear   deafened.   smell   anosmicized.*   feel   benumbed or a___hetized.   taste   ageusized.* *Okay, yes, I made these two up. But let's use them, because they make sense: anosmia really does mean "the loss of the sense of smell," and ageusia really does mean "the loss of the sense of taste." Now let's imagine things get worse. We're not only senseless, we're powerless:   When suddenly we can't...       we've been...   think   dec_____ated.   act   nonp__ed.   move   stunned, paralyzed, or petrified.   speak   dumbfounded. Today we'll explore that last word, dumbfounded. Could you recall all those terms with blanks? If you're not sure, give them a click. (To reveal any word with blanks, give it a click.)     definition: Today, we still use the oldest meaning of the adjective "dumb," which is "unable to talk." We use it both literally (to be dumb is to have no voice or no ability to speak) and figuratively (to be dumb is to be silent because you're shocked or sad). Combine "dumb" with the verb "found," which here means "to confuse," and you get "dumbfound," a word that's been around in English since about 1653.  When something dumbfounds you, it confuses or surprises you so much that you can't even talk. grammatical bits: Part of speech: Verb, the transitive kind: "Their sudden appearance dumbfounded me." Other forms:  Dumbfounds, dumbfounding, dumbfoundingly. how to use it: Because "dumbfounded" takes longer to say than "stunned" or "shocked," and because it describes both an emotion (shock) and an action (not speaking), it's great for calling extra attention to a person's speechlessness in a moment of surprise, either pleasant or unpleasant. "She sat, watching the aurora borealis, dumbfounded." That's the most common way we use this verb: as an adjective in its past participle form. "Dumbfounded, he could only stare at the fire." "When she realized she'd won, she was dumbfounded." examples: "Both armies stared, dumbfounded, as the forty-foot-tall gold and ivory statue came in for a landing."    — Rick Riordan, Blood of Olympus, 2014    "[Daenerys] is so confident and certain of purpose that she seems genuinely dumbfounded when Jon doesn't take the first opportunity to kneel before her."     — Bryan Bishop and Tasha Robinson, The Verge, 31 July 2017 has this page helped you understand "dumbfound"? Awesome, I'm glad it helped! Thanks for letting me know! If you have any questions about this word, please message me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com. study it: Explain the meaning of "dumbfound" without saying "render speechless" or "flabbergast." try it out: Fill in the blanks: "(Something) is a (type of thing) of dumbfounding (size, strength, beauty, or complexity)." Example 1: "The lionfish is a creature of dumbfounding beauty." Example 2: "Beneath her fingernails, the frost makes billions of tiny diadems and coronas on the slats of the bench, a lattice of dumbfounding complexity."    — Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See, 2014    If you like, use this space to write. (To save your work, copy and paste it into an email or a document.) before you review, play: Try to spend 20 seconds or more on the game below. Don’t skip straight to the review—first, let your working memory empty out. Our game for this month: MYP Anagrams! Rearrange the letters in the given word to form a word we've studied before. For example, if I give you THREAD, you give me DEARTH. To see the answer, scroll all the way down. Try this one today: Rearrange the letters in DEUCE to make a verb.  To peek at the clues, highlight the hidden white text below.    The definition is… to figure something out, or to construe it.    The first letter is… E. review this word: 1. A near-opposite of DUMBFOUNDED is A. CEREBRAL (smart or intellectual). B. EFFUSIVE (overflowing with emotional words). C. PLIABLE (easy to persuade, or easy to influence). 2. In A Walk in the Woods, Bill Bryson wrote, "We went and got a cup of coffee and sat for some time in a kind of dumbfounded _____." A. silence B. squabble C. conversation Answers to the review questions: 1. B 2. A Answer to the game question: Educe. To educe something is to figure it out, or to construe it. a final word: I hope you're enjoying Make Your Point. It's made with love. I'm Liesl Johnson, a reading and writing tutor on a mission to explore, illuminate, and celebrate words. From my blog: On vocabulary...       36 ways to study words.       Why we forget words, & how to remember them.       How to use sophisticated words without being awkward. On writing...       How to improve any sentence.       How to motivate our kids to write.       How to stop procrastinating and start writing.       How to bulk up your writing when you have to meet a word count. From my heart: a profound thanks to the generous patrons, donors, and sponsors that make it possible for me to write these emails. If you'd like to be a patron or a donor, please click here. If you'd like to be a sponsor and include your ad in an issue, please contact me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com. A disclaimer: When I write definitions, I use plain language and stick to the words' common, useful applications. If you're interested in authoritative and multiple definitions of words, I encourage you to check a dictionary. Also, because I'm American, I stick to American English when I share words' meanings, usage, and pronunciations; these elements sometimes vary across world Englishes.