COQUETRY

Pronunciation (US):

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does coquetry mean? 

• COQUETRY (noun)
  The noun COQUETRY has 1 sense:

1. playful behavior intended to arouse sexual interest

  Familiarity information: COQUETRY used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• COQUETRY (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Playful behavior intended to arouse sexual interest

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

coquetry; dalliance; flirt; flirtation; flirting; toying

Hypernyms ("coquetry" is a kind of...):

caper; frolic; gambol; play; romp (gay or light-hearted recreational activity for diversion or amusement)

Derivation:

coquet (talk or behave amorously, without serious intentions)

 Context examples 

Do you think Miss Ingram will not suffer from your dishonest coquetry?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

The fair girl, with a laugh of ribald coquetry, turned to answer him:—"You yourself never loved; you never love!"

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

Perhaps my master might refine a little in these speculations, which he had drawn from what he observed himself, or had been told him by others; however, I could not reflect without some amazement, and much sorrow, that the rudiments of lewdness, coquetry, censure, and scandal, should have place by instinct in womankind.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

The inhabitants were all doing well, it seemed and all emulously hoping to do better still, and laying out the surplus of their grains in coquetry; so that the shop fronts stood along that thoroughfare with an air of invitation, like rows of smiling saleswomen.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Annie Moffat's foolish lessons in coquetry came into her mind, and the love of power, which sleeps in the bosoms of the best of little women, woke up all of a sudden and took possession of her.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

To such perseverance in wilful self-deception Elizabeth would make no reply, and immediately and in silence withdrew; determined, if he persisted in considering her repeated refusals as flattering encouragement, to apply to her father, whose negative might be uttered in such a manner as to be decisive, and whose behaviour at least could not be mistaken for the affectation and coquetry of an elegant female.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

She pulled out of her box, about ten minutes ago, a little pink silk frock; rapture lit her face as she unfolded it; coquetry runs in her blood, blends with her brains, and seasons the marrow of her bones.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)