What's the difference between poignant and sentimental?

Poignant


Definition:

  • (a.) Pricking; piercing; sharp; pungent.
  • (a.) Fig.: Pointed; keen; satirical.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Totò was a legend in the Vesuvian city – a comedian of genius; poignant, mysterious.
  • (2) Fleeting though it may have been (he jetted off to New York this morning and is due in Toronto on Saturday), there was a poignant reason for his appearance: he was here to play a tribute set to Frankie Knuckles, the Godfather of house and one of Morales's closest friends, who died suddenly in March.
  • (3) One of the most poignant exchanges came when Tony was asked by @ juliangratton to sum up the last seven years of his life.
  • (4) The exercise yard is adorned with poignant children's paintings in response to school trips here.
  • (5) This double bind may be particularly poignant for grandparents in single mother families.
  • (6) This addition was particularly poignant as Andrew Jackson’s legacy includes the decision to sign the Indian Removal Act of 1830 , which gave the federal government power to expel Native American tribes from their land.
  • (7) This poignant letter, addressing Recep Tayyip Erdogan and written by one of the protesters in Istanbul's historic Taksim Square , was widely circulated on Turkey's social media.
  • (8) Treasure Island gives us an intense sense of place, and a poignant coming-of-age story full of moral ambiguity.
  • (9) Their songs ranged from the almost unbearably poignant ("Hand in Glove") to the frankly vulnerable ("How Soon is Now").
  • (10) The image of the France midfielder walking, head bowed, past the World Cup trophy is one of the more poignant in football history.
  • (11) The second series of BBC1’s hit drama Happy Valley ended on Tuesday night , bowing out in a wondrous blaze of confrontation, perceptive resolution and poignant revelation.
  • (12) Ed Miliband said: "This is a tragic and poignant reminder of the sacrifices made by our armed forces in serving our country with bravery and distinction."
  • (13) But the American author, already the recipient of the Man Booker International prize, the Pulitzer and the National Book award , said it was "particularly poignant for me to have gotten news of the award only a few weeks after the death of Carlos Fuentes, who received the award in 1994".
  • (14) A picture sits on each one of the chairs, decorated by poignant letters, orange flowers and gifts.
  • (15) Or perhaps we could focus on the relationship of Leia and Solo, now married, and there could be a heart-rendingly poignant study of their elderly existence together, rather like Michael Haneke's Amour , but set in space.
  • (16) Dern, all windblown white hair and stubble, is often entirely silent and withdrawn, and all the more compelling and poignant for that.
  • (17) On the basis of this limited but poignant experience, we propose an outline of steps in management to help others avoid similar problems.
  • (18) Yet the narratives in Benefits Street have a human and poignant quality, often presenting decent and compassionate people disenfranchised by an unfair society.
  • (19) Sandy Nairne, director of the NPG, said: "The Van Dyck self-portrait is a poignant portrait of great significance.
  • (20) It was poignant, afterwards, to hear Martínez try to put the human element into some perspective.

Sentimental


Definition:

  • (a.) Having, expressing, or containing a sentiment or sentiments; abounding with moral reflections; containing a moral reflection; didactic.
  • (a.) Inclined to sentiment; having an excess of sentiment or sensibility; indulging the sensibilities for their own sake; artificially or affectedly tender; -- often in a reproachful sense.
  • (a.) Addressed or pleasing to the emotions only, usually to the weaker and the unregulated emotions.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) "Indeed, there was a marked drop in sentiment in Germany , indicating that it is increasingly being affected by the problems elsewhere in the eurozone."
  • (2) Giving voice to that sentiment the mass-selling daily newspaper Ta Nea dedicated its front-page editorial to what it hoped would soon be the group's demise, describing Alexopoulos' desertion as a "positive development".
  • (3) The characteristic mental disturbance includes damage to memory and sentiment, a change in personality, and lowering in spontaneity, but calculation ability and orientation are comparatively preserved.
  • (4) The only Spanish voice heard in Catalonia is that of the Madrid government, which seems oblivious to the implications of the groundswell of pro-independence sentiment, much as at Westminster politicians missed the shift in Scottish opinion until just before the referendum.
  • (5) We still have at our disposal the rational interpretive skills that are the legacy of humanistic education, not as a sentimental piety enjoining us to return to traditional values or the classics but as the active practice of worldly secular rational discourse.
  • (6) One that sentimentality is obsessed by while funds are disproportionately siphoned away from the other 20,933 species facing extinction .
  • (7) The report recommended that governments and international agencies need to counter the anti-vaccination sentiment identified on social media with strong messaging.
  • (8) For some, Aussie still simply means “white”, a sentiment that itself obscures the mostly forgotten English bigotry against the Irish, Australia’s first other.
  • (9) Although Barcelona still needed another, Álvaro Morata’s goal increasing the nerves, and although the Croat’s goal would not prove the winner, the sentiment will be similar in Catalonia now too.
  • (10) Her sentiments echo those of one PKK commander, who says she was not surprised about the sudden breakdown of the peace process.
  • (11) Other controversial voices were Barry Norman, who wondered if Williams’s battles with mental health led him to take on sentimental film projects, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, whose tweet reading “Genie, you’re free” was seen as glorifying suicide .
  • (12) Eduardo Gorab, a property economist at Capital Economics, said: “Clearly, the uncertainty kicked up by the referendum’s result has had an adverse impact on sentiment, which has been driving outflows over the last week or two.
  • (13) To suggest that people who are concerned about the use of a power of this sort against journalists are condoning terrorism, which seems to be the implication of that remark, is an extremely ugly and unhelpful sentiment.
  • (14) Such sentiments are not uncommon in job agencies, particularly those that specialise in factory and food work, where labour demand is variable and geographically shifting, and conditions often arduous.
  • (15) They must have regard to common moral sentiments, and to what will be morally acceptable in the country as a whole (though they can never hope for total agreement with their conclusions).
  • (16) Its possible marriage to the Sheffield city region is overwhelmingly rooted in perceived economic advantage rather than in history or public sentiment.
  • (17) However, Reinfeldt's majority was undermined by the far right, who have sought to harness anti-immigrant sentiment in a country where one in seven residents is foreign-born.
  • (18) Among groups or organizations, it is unusual for changes in sentiment to precede action or organizational rearrangements.
  • (19) The sentiment is shared by Ed Woodward, the executive vice-chairman, who had not envisaged quite how poorly United would fare.
  • (20) The most important polling question right now is ‘Would you consider voting for Candidate X?’ More than 80% of the GOP electorate would consider voting for Rubio – more than any other candidate.” The rise of outsiders such as Trump, neurosurgeon Ben Carson and businesswoman Carly Fiorina, Luntz added, “is a gut emotional reaction by Republicans to Obama, Clinton and even the Republican Congress.” In a nod to the current “anyone-but-DC” sentiment among primary voters, Rubio has recently made subtle changes to his usual stump speech by casting himself as both an underdog and an outsider.