SWEARING

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does swearing mean? 

• SWEARING (noun)
  The noun SWEARING has 2 senses:

1. profane or obscene expression usually of surprise or anger

2. a commitment to tell the truth (especially in a court of law); to lie under oath is to become subject to prosecution for perjury

  Familiarity information: SWEARING used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• SWEARING (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Profane or obscene expression usually of surprise or anger

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

curse; curse word; cuss; expletive; oath; swearing; swearword

Context example:

expletives were deleted

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

profanity (vulgar or irreverent speech or action)

Derivation:

swear (utter obscenities or profanities)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A commitment to tell the truth (especially in a court of law); to lie under oath is to become subject to prosecution for perjury

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

oath; swearing

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

commitment; dedication (a message that makes a pledge)

Derivation:

swear (to declare or affirm solemnly and formally as true)

swear (make a deposition; declare under oath)

 Context examples 

Here's this poor old innocent bird o' mine swearing blue fire, and none the wiser, you may lay to that.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

Wolf Larsen ceased swearing as suddenly as he had begun.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

I think he was swearing, but am not certain; however, he was pronouncing some formula which prevented him from replying to me directly.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

That upon coming nearer, and finding his error, he sent out his long-boat to discover what it was; that his men came back in a fright, swearing they had seen a swimming house.

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

When we find him he is swearing. He swears like hell. Never have I heard a man swear like that man.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

And even your smoking and your swearing—they are part of you and I will love you for them, too.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

With the dogs falling, Mercedes weeping and riding, Hal swearing innocuously, and Charles’s eyes wistfully watering, they staggered into John Thornton’s camp at the mouth of White River.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

So he went off cursing, like the foul-mouthed blackguard that he was, and swearing that he would have her yet.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

A dozen convicts, who descended with their pistols in search of him, found him with a match-box in his hand seated beside an open powder barrel, which was one of a hundred carried on board, and swearing that he would blow all hands up if he were in any way molested.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

But the merit of the curricle did not all belong to the horses; Henry drove so well—so quietly—without making any disturbance, without parading to her, or swearing at them: so different from the only gentleman-coachman whom it was in her power to compare him with!

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)