abuse – English noun declension

English noun forms of abuse

Noun: abuse
Singularabuse
Pluralabuses

Sample Sentences

  • human rights abuses
  • All abuse, whether physical, verbal, psychological or sexual, is bad.
  • Dickens was careful to castigate abuses which were being reformed. [1948, W. R. Inge, The End of an Age and Other Essays:]
  • Liberty may be endangered by the abuses of liberty, as well as by the abuses of power. [1788, James Madison, Federalist, Number 63:]
  • Few concepts are as emotionally charged as that of race. The word conjures up a mixture of associations—culture, ethnicity, genetics, subjugation, exclusion and persecution. But is the tragic history of efforts to define groups of people by race really a matter of the misuse of science, the abuse of a valid biological concept? [2012 March-April, Jan Sapp, “Race Finished”, in American Scientist, volume 100, number 2, archived from the original on 05 Sep 2015, page 164:]
  • RDG explains: "From April 1 2026, the following tickets, Anytime, Off-Peak, Day Travelcards and most Ranger and Rover tickets, will no longer be refundable on the day they become valid for travel." It calls the £40m it thinks it loses "refund abuse", which it explains as "refunds on tickets that have been used but not scanned or endorsed, where a customer falsely states that they did not travel". I'm sure such abuse takes place (and that it's done by passengers). But RDG is taking a sledgehammer to crack a nut and punishing many millions of honest passengers by making tickets more restrictive. [2026 March 18, Philip Haigh, “Tickets please: 2p per scan to offset fraudulent refunds?”, in RAIL, number 1057, page 48:]
  • Or is it some abuse, and no such thing? [1601, William Shakespeare, Hamlet, act IV, scene VII:]
  • children hurling abuse at each other
  • The two parties, after exchanging a good deal of abuse, came to blows. [1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, The history of England: from the accession of James the Second, volume 9, page 153:]
  • But he and all the southerners who indulge in this abuse in the newspapers should realize that this will not enable us to find a solution to our problem but will merely aggravate it. [1950 February 11, Alhaji Na-Alhaji, Gaskiya Fa Ti Kwabo:]
  • The pair – aged 14 and 15 years old – have been accused of assaulting and shouting abuse at four people in central Southampton, police have said. [2020, “Coronavirus: Teenage girls arrested after 'abusing Chinese people wearing face masks in racially-motivated attack'”, in The Independent:]

Etymology

From Middle English abusen, then from either Old French abus (“improper use”), or from Latin abūsus (“misused, using up”), perfect active participle of abūtor (“make improper use of, consume, abuse”), from ab (“away”) + ūtor (“to use”). Equivalent to ab- + use. See: Latin Nouns 'abūsus'.

Verbs referencing "abuse"

Russian Nouns абьюз, Russian Nouns абуз.