SMEAR

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IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does smear mean? 

• SMEAR (noun)
  The noun SMEAR has 4 senses:

1. slanderous defamation

2. a thin tissue or blood sample spread on a glass slide and stained for cytologic examination and diagnosis under a microscope

3. a blemish made by dirt

4. an act that brings discredit to the person who does it

  Familiarity information: SMEAR used as a noun is uncommon.

• SMEAR (verb)
  The verb SMEAR has 4 senses:

1. stain by smearing or daubing with a dirty substance

2. make a smudge on; soil by smudging

3. cover (a surface) by smearing (a substance) over it

4. charge falsely or with malicious intent; attack the good name and reputation of someone

  Familiarity information: SMEAR used as a verb is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• SMEAR (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Slanderous defamation

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

malignment; smear; vilification

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

calumniation; calumny; defamation; hatchet job; obloquy; traducement (a false accusation of an offense or a malicious misrepresentation of someone's words or actions)

Derivation:

smear (charge falsely or with malicious intent; attack the good name and reputation of someone)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A thin tissue or blood sample spread on a glass slide and stained for cytologic examination and diagnosis under a microscope

Classified under:

Nouns denoting body parts

Synonyms:

cytologic smear; cytosmear; smear

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

cytologic specimen (a specimen used for cytologic examination and diagnosis)

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

alimentary tract smear (any of several cytologic smears obtained from different parts of the alimentary tract; obtained by specialized lavage techniques and used mainly to diagnose cancer in those parts)

cervical smear; Pap smear; Papanicolaou smear (a sample of secretions and superficial cells of the uterine cervix and uterus; examined with a microscope to detect any abnormal cells)

bronchoscopic smear; lower respiratory tract smear; sputum smear (any of several cytologic smears obtained from different parts of the lower respiratory tract; used for cytologic study of cancer and other diseases of the lungs)

vaginal smear (smear taken from the vaginal mucosa for cytological analysis)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A blemish made by dirt

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

blot; daub; slur; smear; smirch; smudge; spot

Context example:

he had a smudge on his cheek

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

blemish; defect; mar (a mark or flaw that spoils the appearance of something (especially on a person's body))

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

blotch; splodge; splotch (an irregularly shaped spot)

fingermark; fingerprint (a smudge made by a (dirty) finger)

inkblot (a blot made with ink)

Derivation:

smear (make a smudge on; soil by smudging)

smear (stain by smearing or daubing with a dirty substance)

Sense 4

Meaning:

An act that brings discredit to the person who does it

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

blot; smear; smirch; spot; stain

Context example:

he made a huge blot on his copybook

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

error; fault; mistake (a wrong action attributable to bad judgment or ignorance or inattention)

• SMEAR (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they smear    ... he / she / it smears   
Past simple: smeared   
Past participle: smeared   
-ing form: smearing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Stain by smearing or daubing with a dirty substance

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

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

begrime; bemire; colly; dirty; grime; soil (make soiled, filthy, or dirty)

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

moil (moisten or soil)

besmirch; smirch (smear so as to make dirty or stained)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Derivation:

smear (a blemish made by dirt)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Make a smudge on; soil by smudging

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

blur; smear; smudge; smutch

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

rub (move over something with pressure)

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

resmudge (smudge again)

dust (rub the dust over a surface so as to blur the outlines of a shape)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Sentence examples:

The children smear the paper with grease
The children smear grease onto the paper

Derivation:

smear (a blemish made by dirt)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Cover (a surface) by smearing (a substance) over it

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Synonyms:

daub; smear

Context example:

daub the ceiling with plaster

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

cover (provide with a covering or cause to be covered)

Verb group:

daub (apply to a surface)

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

blood (smear with blood, as in a hunting initiation rite, where the face of a person is smeared with the blood of the kill)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something PP

Sense 4

Meaning:

Charge falsely or with malicious intent; attack the good name and reputation of someone

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Synonyms:

asperse; besmirch; calumniate; defame; denigrate; slander; smear; smirch; sully

Context example:

The article in the paper sullied my reputation

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

accuse; charge (blame for, make a claim of wrongdoing or misbehavior against)

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

assassinate (destroy or damage seriously, as of someone's reputation)

libel (print slanderous statements against)

badmouth; drag through the mud; malign; traduce (speak unfavorably about)

Sentence frames:

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

Derivation:

smear (slanderous defamation)

 Context examples 

It is based on the morphologic and cytochemical evaluation of bone marrow and peripheral blood smears.

(French-American-British Classification, NCI Thesaurus)

Diagnosis is made by demonstration of typical intracellular Donovan bodies in crushed-tissue smears.

(Granuloma Inguinale, NLM, Medical Subject Headings)

Instead it is spatially smeared into nearby pixels (voxels) corresponding to its surrounding medium.

(Image Spillover, NCI Thesaurus)

A variation of lymphocytes found in a peripheral blood smear that are larger, with abundant cytoplasm, and having nuclei with multiple nucleoli.

(Atypical Lymphocytes Present in Peripheral Blood, NCI Thesaurus)

An abnormality often noted in pap smears.

(Koilocytotic Atypia, NCI Thesaurus)

The study of bone marrow smears is routinely used for the investigation, diagnosis, and staging of hematopoietic disorders.

(Bone Marrow Smear, NCI Thesaurus)

The light microscopic study of normal and abnormal cells in fine needle aspirates (FNAs), body cavity fluids, and smears.

(Cytology, NCI Thesaurus)

Smears are prepared, rapidly fixed in methanol and stained.

(Epithelial Cell Aggregation and Separation, NCI Thesaurus)

In women, Pap smears can detect changes in the cervix that might lead to cancer.

(HPV, NIH: National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases)

When she had entered two or three laborious items in the account-book, Jip would walk over the page, wagging his tail, and smear them all out.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)