What's the difference between smile and sneer?

Smile


Definition:

  • (v. i.) To express amusement, pleasure, moderate joy, or love and kindness, by the features of the face; to laugh silently.
  • (v. i.) To express slight contempt by a look implying sarcasm or pity; to sneer.
  • (v. i.) To look gay and joyous; to have an appearance suited to excite joy; as, smiling spring; smiling plenty.
  • (v. i.) To be propitious or favorable; to favor; to countenance; -- often with on; as, to smile on one's labors.
  • (v. t.) To express by a smile; as, to smile consent; to smile a welcome to visitors.
  • (v. t.) To affect in a certain way with a smile.
  • (v. i.) The act of smiling; a peculiar change or brightening of the face, which expresses pleasure, moderate joy, mirth, approbation, or kindness; -- opposed to frown.
  • (v. i.) A somewhat similar expression of countenance, indicative of satisfaction combined with malevolent feelings, as contempt, scorn, etc; as, a scornful smile.
  • (v. i.) Favor; countenance; propitiousness; as, the smiles of Providence.
  • (v. i.) Gay or joyous appearance; as, the smiles of spring.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) But mention the words "eurozone crisis" to other Finns, and you could be rewarded with little more than a confused, albeit friendly, smile.
  • (2) But after 26.2 miles of pain it may be harder to keep that smile on his face.
  • (3) Speed's mother said she had watched again some television footage of her son before his death and realised his smile didn't seem genuine as "it didn't extend to his eyes".
  • (4) But there she sits with a strained smile as he serenades her before an audience of millions.
  • (5) I remind him that he had been unhappy with the penalty awarded to Barcelona in the Champions League game at Wembley last season, and he smiles.
  • (6) He was a fixture at Trump rallies, where he met chants of “Lock her up” against Hillary Clinton with a smile.
  • (7) I didn’t see him tonight,” smiled the alderman.
  • (8) Gough, as the degenerate black sheep of an English family trying to blackmail an American adulterer, would curl a long lip into a sneering smile, which became a characteristic of this fine actor's style.
  • (9) That’s before you even begin to consider the sort of outfits, polite eating and staged photos that guarantee I end up with a bleeding foot, skirt tucked into my knickers, mint in my teeth and a fixed smile last seen on a taxidermied pike.
  • (10) "Anne Hathaway at least tried to sing and dance and preen along to the goings on, but Franco seemed distant, uninterested and content to keep his Cheshire-cat-meets-smug smile on display throughout."
  • (11) But that doesn't mean that I can't make jokes about it, or help noticing the smiles on women's faces whenever this case is mentioned.
  • (12) "He would say he was a peaceful man, whose smile gives hope."
  • (13) When he smiles, he looks as cute and gummy as a newborn.
  • (14) I know I am loved by some clubs, especially one, and in Spain the situation is a bit different because some people hate me," Mourinho continued, adding with a smile: "And many of you are in this room."
  • (15) Expressions that included muscular activity around the eyes in addition to the smiling lips occurred more often when people were actually enjoying themselves as compared with when enjoyment was feigned to conceal negative emotions.
  • (16) Blue jean baby, LA lady, seamstress for the band Pretty eyed, pirate smile, you’ll marry a music man Ballerina, you must have seen her, dancing in the sand And now she’s in me, always with me, tiny dancer in my hand For a moment it seemed possible that the person about to get out of the plane was a man of subtle taste and kindness, a man who could appreciate such beauty, who was secure enough in himself to set his arrival in Sacramento to the soundtrack of a 45-year-old song by a gay troubadour.
  • (17) Singh said a smiling Mandela had asked "Is that me?"
  • (18) He smiled enigmatically when the questions turned to Greece and the possibility of a country leaving the euro, before dismissing such talk as "not being the working assumption of mine or any government".
  • (19) He was alive, he was walking unaided, and he was smiling.
  • (20) While there are smiles in the Ennis-Hill household, the organisers of the Commonwealth Games will be ruing the loss of a major star – especially as Britain's 5,000m and 10,000m Olympic gold medallist Mo Farah has admitted that the games are "not on my list" for 2014, and the 100m world record holder Usain Bolt is yet to commit.

Sneer


Definition:

  • (v. i.) To show contempt by turning up the nose, or by a particular facial expression.
  • (v. i.) To inssinuate contempt by a covert expression; to speak derisively.
  • (v. i.) To show mirth awkwardly.
  • (v. t.) To utter with a grimace or contemptuous expression; to utter with a sneer; to say sneeringly; as, to sneer fulsome lies at a person.
  • (v. t.) To treat with sneers; to affect or move by sneers.
  • (n.) The act of sneering.
  • (n.) A smile, grin, or contortion of the face, indicative of contempt; an indirect expression or insinuation of contempt.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) He made his political base in this western province, which has long felt sneered at: Harper has spent his political career redressing the balance.
  • (2) Gough, as the degenerate black sheep of an English family trying to blackmail an American adulterer, would curl a long lip into a sneering smile, which became a characteristic of this fine actor's style.
  • (3) Comment is perfectly legitimate, but the sneering, supercilious, specious and dismissive contributions masquerading as ‘commentary’ belittle the claims of a ‘quality’ paper.” Before attempting to assess the validity of the reader’s analysis – broadly shared by some other readers – I think his email reflects one or two other interesting aspects of the demographics of the Guardian’s readership and the left.
  • (4) Webb agreed, calling Miliband "irresponsible" for "stirring up cheap headlines", sneering: "Why doesn't the government set a price cap on a tin of beans?"
  • (5) I think it's a good thing that comedians want to exploit (and relieve) our anxieties about what's sayable – but only if we as audiences become bolder in opposing comedy that bullies, comedy that sneers at the vulnerable and the under-represented, comedy that feels, in Herring's words, "like being at school and going, 'Ha ha, you're a spastic.'"
  • (6) Over the years the Oscars have been variously coveted and sneered at, have increasingly brought box-office value and personal prestige, become a media obsession, a gauge of industrial morale and a way of taking the national pulse.
  • (7) It has sneered at the 1906 reforms of Lloyd George , who recognised that 19th-century philanthropy (which was always pretty judgmental and selective) was no longer adequate for a modern industrial country.
  • (8) Merkel grimly submitted to an executive fashion makeover after the media sneered at her frumpy look; now she clearly relishes shining out in jewel-toned jackets from a forest of dark suits at G20 meetings.
  • (9) At which point – obviously – you reach the stubborn limits of the debate: from even the most supposedly imaginative Labour people as much as any Tories, such heresies would presumably be greeted with sneering derision.
  • (10) This is so corny, what I'm saying, but I feel obliged to drone on about it, because before we reach the tipping point, it's time to stop sneering at fat people, being disapproving and bossing them about: walk to work, eat your greens, control yourselves.
  • (11) Henry Barnes The clergy may not be entirely trustworthy This may not be big news to cinemagoers – sneering at religious types goes all the way back to DW Griffith's Intolerance – but Cannes boasts an impressively ecumenical approach.
  • (12) Chindamo's trial, the following year, heard how the teenager, who came to Britain from Italy at the age of five, sneered as he slapped, punched and then stabbed the headteacher.
  • (13) Oh, but now this is highfalutin identity politics to be sneered at along with your safe spaces and trigger warnings.
  • (14) Hours after Tuesday’s bomb attack on a tourist area of Istanbul , Erdoğan delivered a sneering criticism of Chomsky and “so-called intellectuals” who had signed a letter calling on Turkey to end the “deliberate massacre” of Kurdish people in the south east of the country, He invited Chomsky to visit the area in a defiant televised speech to a conference of Turkish ambassadors in Ankara.
  • (15) "I always hated the expression anyway, mostly because I encountered it in stupid or sneering contexts."
  • (16) Naturally, Michael Gove , former Times columnist, responded to the thousands of economists who warned he was taking an extraordinary risk with the sneer that will follow him to his grave: “People in this country have had enough of experts.” He’s been saying the same for years.
  • (17) It is easy to sneer at the journalistic concept of the Angry Young Man (a phrase, incidentally, coined by a dismissive Royal Court press officer).
  • (18) But Winterbottom, a competent pre-war centre-half for Manchester United, unfairly sneered at by some England international veterans as one who had never played, was, in essence, a bureaucrat rather than a technician, who would admit his other job – yes, he had two!
  • (19) The decision to have clip-on ties, favoured for police officers, sneered at by those who believe "children should learn to do ties up from an early age", is already paying off, with not a single tie out of place.
  • (20) If you ever feel tempted to say "status quo" or "cul de sac", for instance, Orwell will sneer at you for "pretentious diction".