What's the difference between impertinent and irreverent?

Impertinent


Definition:

  • (a.) Not pertinent; not pertaining to the matter in hand; having no bearing on the subject; not to the point; irrelevant; inapplicable.
  • (a.) Contrary to, or offending against, the rules of propriety or good breeding; guilty of, or prone to, rude, unbecoming, or uncivil words or actions; as, an impertient coxcomb; an impertient remark.
  • (a.) Trifing; inattentive; frivolous.
  • (n.) An impertinent person.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) I could stick my nose into everyone else's business and ask all the impertinent questions I wanted to.
  • (2) That is an impertinent question,” Abbott said when asked by a journalist whether he had been drunk.
  • (3) Linda Tirado, writer on poverty: ‘My instinct is to set off around the country asking impertinent questions’ Facebook Twitter Pinterest Linda Tirado photographed in Washington, DC: ‘At least I have fertile land and a defensible perimeter.’ Photograph: Scott Suchman for the Observer I live in the heart of Trump country, in Meigs County, Ohio, a rural county struggling with poverty and addiction.
  • (4) When I awoke today on LA time my phone was full of impertinent digital eulogies.
  • (5) After I rebuked him for his impertinence in waiting in the wrong place, thereby delaying me for at least 12 seconds, he lead me out to his highly polished black Cadillac sedan.
  • (6) "British values" has unfortunately often ended up sounding like an impertinent appropriation of universal human values such as fairness, tolerance and the like.
  • (7) When the young atheists asked why they should submit to this impertinent demand, the hacks replied that the T-shirts were "of course, offensive".
  • (8) From Proust to Ellen DeGeneres, 10 gay works that changed the world Read more Of course, by highlighting the sexualities of these writers, I’m engaging in much the same impertinence.
  • (9) It emerged on Tuesday that Dershowitz has moved to formally strike the “outrageous and impertinent” allegations against him contained in the same Florida court motion naming the prince, which accuses the Harvard lawyer of having sexual relations with a minor in private planes and properties owned by Epstein.
  • (10) Though not so much as to accept the impertinent offer of marriage from Mr Guppy, for – if it is not too much to hope – I rather think that in 500 pages or so I may be betrothed to the handsome and warm-hearted Dr Woodcourt who gave me some reason for encouragement before leaving the narrative after being nice to Young Jo.
  • (11) Brendon Sewill, author of a history of Gatwick, Tangled Wings, and chair of the Gatwick Area Conservation Campaign, said it was "impertinent" of Wingate to suggest that opposition had died away.
  • (12) Men make deliberately negative remarks to young women – impertinent comments about their clothes or hair – expecting to pique their interest and undermine their confidence at the same time.
  • (13) At a time when voting was extended to more working men, its newly enfranchised visitors could rant at a disliked politician or stare impertinently into the eyes of royalty.
  • (14) You suspected, too, that Frank Farina, the coach, had addressed them on the impertinence of Eriksson's scheme for this game.
  • (15) As a good Indian boy brought up to respect elders, such intergenerational impertinence doesn't come readily.
  • (16) By Tuesday he had launched a legal bid to formally strike the “outrageous and impertinent” claims about him containing in court filing, promised imminent defamation proceedings against Roberts and her lawyers, in both US and English courts, and submitted a sworn affidavit denying the accusations.
  • (17) Dear Mahvash Sabet, It’s almost an impertinence, I feel, to write to a poet who is being kept behind bars for her words and beliefs.
  • (18) None of the Oxford academics had such preposterous questions and his impertinence was treated was patronising disdain.
  • (19) He said the “factual details regarding with whom and where” she had sex were “immaterial and impertinent” to her argument that she should be allowed to join the lawsuit.
  • (20) "It is not meant to be anti-Sarkozy, but to be impertinent.

Irreverent


Definition:

  • (a.) Not reverent; showing a want of reverence; expressive of a want of veneration; as, an irreverent babbler; an irreverent jest.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) This country has had a free press for the last 300 years, that has been irreverent and rude as my website is and holding public officials to account.
  • (2) Animal Practice is a Universal Television production based on an irreverent New York veterinarian, played by Justin Kirk of Weeds and Angels in America.
  • (3) There has been much pointing-and-chortling of late at the Daily Mail's embarrassing failure to stoke national outrage over a mildly irreverent comment about the Queen's sex life blurted out by Jack Whitehall on a festive panel show.
  • (4) One irreverent Australian columnist has suggested that the "Lizard of Oz" may now be more fitting, given that the Aboriginal meaning for Kadina, the country town north of Adelaide where Crosby grew up, is "Lizard Plain".
  • (5) He showed an irreverence for the lives of the great composers that sometimes came in for criticism.
  • (6) Ian Hislop, the long-serving editor, had a suitably topical and irreverent take on the vicissitudes of the magazine's circulation.
  • (7) The required skill of comedians-turned-presenters is to seem irreverent while rocking no boats.
  • (8) In our own time, Brooke has become the haunting symbol of a doomed generation, flitting across the pages of novels by Alan Hollinghurst and AS Byatt like a volatile and irreverent Peter Pan.
  • (9) Newsnight presenter Jeremy Paxman described Entwistle as "clever, erudite, a man, critically, who reads books, a man with a sense of humour and a great degree of irreverence, not least about the BBC.
  • (10) He could often be seen eating spicy lamb chops at his favourite curry houses, flattering local businessmen and speaking irreverently about parliamentary colleagues.
  • (11) He achieved a succession of scoops, and was largely responsible for training up a generation of gifted young journalists, notably the irreverent gossip columnist, Nigel Dempster ...
  • (12) But, unlike the supine press so common abroad, they still have the irreverent vigour and diversity of a true political safeguard.
  • (13) "I love that a country capable of extraordinary pomp and ceremony can still retain a spiky irreverence towards its establishment.
  • (14) Hall might be a scion of one of Britain's most important theatrical dynasties (his father is Peter, his half-sister Rebecca), but the cocky irreverence of his productions showed he had every intention of making his own mark.
  • (15) "The culture of protest needs to develop," one of the members of Pussy Riot said last month, and indeed as much as the band represent a form of protest in Russia, they also embody a shift in culture that echoes the DIY culture that flourished in the Seattle and Olympia areas of Washington in the early 90s – fanzines, garage punk bands, a tone of wild irreverence and a wish to question tradition.
  • (16) Jordan’s al-Hudoud, a bundle of irreverent online fun, recently ran a delightful story about the arrest of Father Christmas and the confiscation of presents he was distributing.
  • (17) Because they seemed to represent the best of journalistic virtues – courage, campaigning, toughness, compassion, humour, irreverence; a serious engagement with serious things; a sense of fairness; an eye for injustice; a passion for explaining; knowing how to achieve impact; a connection with readers.
  • (18) Many Muscovites were happy enough to see a tough response to the band's irreverent act of rebellion, which was aimed at President Vladimir Putin .
  • (19) I mean merely to josh, not to be blatantly irreverent, for who would seriously argue that Roth's career is not worthy of celebration?
  • (20) Catch-22 was an irreverent, savage and cruel satire.