gauche
Lacking social polish
Gauche describes behavior or manner that is socially awkward, tactless, or lacking grace.
Someone gauche says the wrong thing at dinner parties, makes guests uncomfortable, or handles delicate situations clumsily: It would be gauche to ask how much they paid for the house.
The word carries a whiff of unsophistication—not outright rudeness, but a failure to read the room.
Lacking physical coordination
- ineptLacking skill or competence
- ungainlyLacking ease of movement
- maladroitLacking physical deftness
- gracelessLacking smoothness or charm
bumbling · fumbling · gawky · uncoordinated · stiff · lumbering · oafish · klutzy
Not processed or polished
- provincialRegional or narrow-minded
- rusticRural and unrefined
- unculturedLacking refinement or education
- naiveInnocently unsuspecting
unworldly · parochial · coarse · unpolished · simple · crude · raw · uneducated
Lacking refinement or tact
- insensitiveUnaware of others' emotions
- crassCrudely lacking refinement
- uncouthLacking good manners
- bluntDull or tactlessly direct
brash · impolite · discourteous · undiplomatic · boorish · crude · rude · inconsiderate
clumsy
Lacking physical coordination
graceless · bumbling · fumbling · gawky · uncoordinated · stiff · lumbering · oafish · klutzy · blundering
unrefined
Not processed or polished
- provincialRegional or narrow-minded
- rusticRural and unrefined
- unculturedLacking refinement or education
naive · unworldly · parochial · coarse · unpolished · simple · crude · raw · uneducated · unschooled
indelicate
Lacking refinement or tact
- insensitiveUnaware of others' emotions
- crassCrudely lacking refinement
- uncouthLacking good manners
blunt · brash · impolite · discourteous · undiplomatic · boorish · crude · rude · inconsiderate · offensive
sinister
Threateningly suggestive of harm
escutcheon · blazon · bend · canton · fess · charge · quarter · arms · bearing · field
- French Loanwordsa la carte, ballet, a la mode, au revoir, bon appetit
- borrowed wordschic, naive, passe, avant-garde, faux
- unrefinedcrude, coarse, rough, unpolished, uncouth
- unstylishnessunstylish, unfashionable, tastelessness, dowdiness, frumpiness
- Stereochemistrychirality, stereoisomer, enantiomer, conformer, axial
- aestheticsaesthetics, aesthetic, beauty, beautiful, ugly
gauchesuave
Smoothly refined in manner
sophisticated · urbane · polished · refined · graceful
gauchepoised
Calm and controlled
self-possessed · assured · composed · confident · self-assured