PROSTITUTE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does prostitute mean? 

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

1. a woman who engages in sexual intercourse for money

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

• PROSTITUTE (verb)
  The verb PROSTITUTE has 1 sense:

1. sell one's body; exchange sex for money

  Familiarity information: PROSTITUTE used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• PROSTITUTE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A woman who engages in sexual intercourse for money

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

bawd; cocotte; cyprian; fancy woman; harlot; lady of pleasure; prostitute; sporting lady; tart; whore; woman of the street; working girl

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

adult female; woman (an adult female person (as opposed to a man))

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "prostitute"):

call girl (a female prostitute who can be hired by telephone)

camp follower (a prostitute who provides service to military personnel)

comfort woman; ianfu (a woman forced into prostitution for Japanese servicemen during World War II)

demimondaine (a female prostitute)

floozie; floozy; hooker; hustler; slattern; street girl; streetwalker (a prostitute who attracts customers by walking the streets)

white slave (a woman sold into prostitution)

Derivation:

prostitute (sell one's body; exchange sex for money)

• PROSTITUTE (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they prostitute    ... he / she / it prostitutes   
Past simple: prostituted   
Past participle: prostituted   
-ing form: prostituting   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Sell one's body; exchange sex for money

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

Hypernyms (to "prostitute" is one way to...):

sell (exchange or deliver for money or its equivalent)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "prostitute"):

street-walk; streetwalk (walk the streets in search of customers)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s
Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

prostitute (a woman who engages in sexual intercourse for money)

prostitution (offering sexual intercourse for pay)

 Context examples 

You are cutting your throat every day you waste in them trying to prostitute beauty to the needs of magazinedom.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

These trials include pregnant women, women at risk of AIDS, female prostitutes, and women who have perinatally transmitted AIDS to a fetus or newborn.

(AIDS, Clinical Trials on Women, NCI Thesaurus)

Whether those holy lords I spoke of were always promoted to that rank upon account of their knowledge in religious matters, and the sanctity of their lives; had never been compliers with the times, while they were common priests; or slavish prostitute chaplains to some nobleman, whose opinions they continued servilely to follow, after they were admitted into that assembly?

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

Neither could I be wholly unmoved, after comparing the living with the dead, when I considered how all these pure native virtues were prostituted for a piece of money by their grand-children; who, in selling their votes and managing at elections, have acquired every vice and corruption that can possibly be learned in a court.

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

I told him “we fed on a thousand things which operated contrary to each other; that we ate when we were not hungry, and drank without the provocation of thirst; that we sat whole nights drinking strong liquors, without eating a bit, which disposed us to sloth, inflamed our bodies, and precipitated or prevented digestion; that prostitute female Yahoos acquired a certain malady, which bred rottenness in the bones of those who fell into their embraces; that this, and many other diseases, were propagated from father to son; so that great numbers came into the world with complicated maladies upon them; that it would be endless to give him a catalogue of all diseases incident to human bodies, for they would not be fewer than five or six hundred, spread over every limb and joint—in short, every part, external and intestine, having diseases appropriated to itself. To remedy which, there was a sort of people bred up among us in the profession, or pretence, of curing the sick. And because I had some skill in the faculty, I would, in gratitude to his honour, let him know the whole mystery and method by which they proceed.

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

But when some confessed they owed their greatness and wealth to sodomy, or incest; others, to the prostituting of their own wives and daughters; others, to the betraying of their country or their prince; some, to poisoning; more to the perverting of justice, in order to destroy the innocent, I hope I may be pardoned, if these discoveries inclined me a little to abate of that profound veneration, which I am naturally apt to pay to persons of high rank, who ought to be treated with the utmost respect due to their sublime dignity, by us their inferiors.

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

For having strictly examined all the persons of greatest name in the courts of princes, for a hundred years past, I found how the world had been misled by prostitute writers, to ascribe the greatest exploits in war, to cowards; the wisest counsel, to fools; sincerity, to flatterers; Roman virtue, to betrayers of their country; piety, to atheists; chastity, to sodomites; truth, to informers: how many innocent and excellent persons had been condemned to death or banishment by the practising of great ministers upon the corruption of judges, and the malice of factions: how many villains had been exalted to the highest places of trust, power, dignity, and profit: how great a share in the motions and events of courts, councils, and senates might be challenged by bawds, whores, pimps, parasites, and buffoons.

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