(v. i.) To delay; to pause; to suspend proceedings or judgment in view of a doubt or difficulty; to hesitate; to put off the determination or conclusion of an affair.
(v. i.) To scruple or object; to take exception; as, I demur to that statement.
(v. i.) To interpose a demurrer. See Demurrer, 2.
(v. t.) To suspend judgment concerning; to doubt of or hesitate about.
(v. t.) To cause delay to; to put off.
(v. i.) Stop; pause; hesitation as to proceeding; suspense of decision or action; scruple.
Example Sentences:
(1) His monstrous wardrobe, his entourages of 300 or 400 ferried in four aeroplanes, his huge bedouin tent, complete with accompanying camel, pitched in public parks or in the grounds of five-star hotels – and his bodyguards of gun-toting young women, who, though by no means hiding their charms beneath demure Islamic veils, were all supposedly virgins, and sworn to give their lives for their leader.
(2) When the time came for Mayer to give a speech, she demurred for a moment before standing.
(3) Strange then that among my generation of friends, adolescent in the early 1980s, there was a sort of discretion verging on the demure when it came to discussing contraception.
(4) Pressed on whether the upheaval has reached him, Frost repeatedly, if unsurprisingly, demurs.
(5) I’d ask that, instead of demanding black voters’ unquestioning loyalty to Sanders, they interrogate what racism is before demurring to a class analysis that still leaves my working-class family members dead in the street.
(6) The Villa clamours for attention on the waterfront, the embarrassingly shouty younger sibling of its more demure neighbour, the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilisations (Mucem).
(7) Pressed in an interview with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in mid-October, he demurred.
(8) Asked by the Associated Press whether her instant fame had led her to think about higher political office – there has been speculation she could run against Perry for the governor's mansion or attempt to gain a Texas seat in the US senate – she demurred.
(9) Asked directly if it was fair to say that Obama has been a better president for America than Putin has been for Russia, Cornyn demurred: “I’m not gonna go down that path.” Bob Corker, the senator from Tennessee who chairs the Senate foreign relations committee, also initially said he was no longer responding to each one of Trump’s controversial statements.
(10) The Pope liked Benedictines and told Hume, when he demurred at the appointment, that he was asking him to accept "the call of the Lord."
(11) This has gone from being a matter of curiosity, and a matter of politics, to being a national security issue.” Trump demurred on Wednesday when asked if he would release his tax returns before the November election, saying it was “not a big deal” and that he had released 104 pages of documents related to his business dealings.
(12) The three Alexander McQueen outfits that made the most front pages from the Duchess of Cambridge's recent tour wardrobe were: a sky blue belted knee-length coat, accessorised with navy round-toe suede shoes and a matching clutch bag; a demure dove grey coat with a jaunty grey hat; and a ballet-shoe pink peplum top and skirt, which the duchess wore with LK Bennett courts and pearl drop earrings.
(13) Upon learning that an internal campaign memo had instructed surrogates to demur on questions about Trump University, Trump said in a conference call on Monday that they instead should attack journalists who raised the point.
(14) The alternative would be to break out of character at the end, and demurely ask for money – which, again, would rather break the spell.
(15) Accommodation was provided by Le Manoir in Gemenos (doubles from €90 a night), Domaine de Valbrillant in Meyreuil (from €75) and Le Demure Insoupconnée in Cassis (from €130).
(16) He has generally been seen as a Labour supporter and doesn't demur when I mention that perception, so would the coming of a Conservative government next year present problems for him?
(17) If the Italian is seen as high maintenance his appointment is also regarded as a high-stakes gamble on Short's part, but Di Canio demurred.
(18) "We should put a spit up his ass," said Susan Hennesy, a demure-looking software engineer who works a few blocks away.
(19) Bankers are seen as greedy, librarians as demure, journalists as sleazy, nurses as angels and estate agents as dishonest.
(20) That may have come as a surprise to the assembled dignitaries, but of course none demurred.
Hesitation
Definition:
(n.) The act of hesitating; suspension of opinion or action; doubt; vacillation.
(n.) A faltering in speech; stammering.
Example Sentences:
(1) It appeared Dunaway and Warren Beatty had an envelope containing a card naming a previous award won by La La Land, prompting visible hesitation between the two veteran actors before Dunaway went ahead and named La La Land.
(2) Nocturia (OR 1.8) and hesitancy (OR 4.3) were found to be predictive of surgery for younger men (age range 49-55), while only nocturia (OR 2.4) was predictive among older men (age range 62-68).
(3) Maybe this will be increasing the frequency of patrols, or going to places that the Obama administration has been hesitant to go – such as actually undertaking a non-innocent passage military patrols within 12 miles of an artificial island.
(4) The standards committee report by a cross-party group of MPs said it "deplored" stings but would "not hesitate to act in such cases if wrongdoing had occurred".
(5) The Senate’s economic references committee accused Asic of missing or ignoring persistent signs of wrongdoing , characterising it as a “timid, hesitant regulator” that was too ready to uncritically accept assurances of a large institution that there were no grounds for intervention.
(6) April 16, 2014 The hesitancy – or unwillingness – of Ukrainian troops to use their weapons has produced multiple awkward confrontations with civilian crowds Wednesday, including one in Pchyolkino south of Kratamorsk, which seems still to be unresolved after an hours-long standoff.
(7) He "jumped without hesitation", said official sources quoted in the Daily Breeze.
(8) But the character – compounded of piercing sanity and existential despair, infinite hesitation and impulsive action, self-laceration and observant irony – is so multi-faceted, it is bound to coincide at some point with an actor’s particular gifts.
(9) The Clinton campaign manager also hesitated when asked if any of his staff had access to Sanders’ records, saying he was sure no one had “reached into Bernie Sanders’ data and extracted it in the way that the Bernie Sanders campaign did this week”.
(10) Their hesitations are focusing in on provisions to cut more than $800bn from the Medicaid budget by phasing out the expansion of the program that had brought healthcare coverage to an extra 11 million adult Americans.
(11) Photograph: Alamy While most politicians would have immediately sent for the drillers, Acosta hesitated.
(12) For instance; hesitant to go to a hot spring, or on a trip with friends (76%), hesitant to go to a clinic or a hospital for physical check-ups and common illness (74%), troublesome to wear special underwear (69%), inconvenient because ordinary clothes cannot be worn (56%), distressed when viewing own body (52%), unable to dress in thin clothes in hot summer season (50%), imbalance of the breasts (49%), inconvenient to participate in sports (47%).
(13) Few would hesitate to allow their data to be used in a project that could improve outcomes for everyone.
(14) But Fallon said that “ we would not hesitate ” to kill others whom the UK understands to represent active terrorist threats, all without disclosing the evidence justifying that designation or subjecting it to scrutiny.
(15) Fox himself has seemed a little hesitant on the few occasions he has answered questions about Werritty.
(16) The referring physician should not hesitate to ask for perioperative mortality statistics from the referral center.
(17) Ms Williams's name will already be familiar to many gay rights campaigners courtesy of a memorable speech on same-sex relationships, in which she applauded Jamaica's criminalisation of what her sect considers a curable aberration, a diagnosis she did not hesitate to apply to Tom Daly.
(18) Then Jake Connor, an 18-year-old who replaced Scott Grix for only his second senior appearance and looked admirably composed from the start, exploited some hesitant defence down Warrington's left to ground the ball in an Atkins tackle.
(19) A statement issued by the North Korean military warned that it would carry out "strong physical retaliations without hesitation if South Korean warmongers carry out reckless military provocations".
(20) Transsexuals who had not undergone surgery, although it had been offered to them providing they fulfilled the usual requirements, were classified into various subgroups, measured according to their attitude towards sex reassignment surgery: they were transsexuals with an unaltered wish for surgery, transsexuals who were ambivalent towards surgery (hesitating patients), and transsexuals who had relinquished their wish for surgery and lived in the initial gender role.