An example of deprecate is when you tell someone his idea is really stupid and that he should be quiet.
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transitive verb
-·cat·ed, -·cat·ingOrigin of deprecate
from Classical Latin deprecatus, past participle of deprecari, to ward off by intercession from de-, off, from + precari, pray
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transitive verb
de·pre·cat·ed, de·pre·cat·ing, de·pre·catesOrigin of deprecate
Latin dēprecārī dēprecāt- to ward off by prayer dē- de- precārī to pray ; see prek- in Indo-European roots.Related Forms:
adverb
noun
noun
Usage Note: Deprecate originally meant “to pray in order to ward off something, ward off by prayer.” Perhaps because the occasion of such prayers was invariably one of dread, the word developed the more general meaning of disapproval, as in this quotation from Frederick Douglass: “Those who profess to favor freedom, yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground.” From here it was a small step to add the meaning “to make little of, disparage,” which was once the proper meaning of depreciate. This meaning of depreciate appears to have been overwhelmed by the word's use in the world of finances, where it means “to diminish (or cause to diminish) in price or value.” In similar fashion, the “disparage” sense of deprecate may be driving out the word's other uses. In our 2002 survey, only 50 percent of the Usage Panel accepted deprecate when it meant “to express disapproval of” in the sentence He advocates a well-designed program of behavior modification and deprecates the early use of medication to address behavioral problems. Moreover, a similar example in the same survey elicited the same split in opinion among Panelists: He acknowledged that some students had been wronged by the board's handling of the matter and deprecated the board's decision to intervene. It seems clear, then, that the Panel has very mixed feelings about the use of deprecate to mean “disapprove of.” But a great majority of Panelists accept deprecate when used to mean “make little of, disparage.” Fully 78 percent accepted the example He deprecated his own contribution to the success of the project, claiming that others had done just as much. It may be that the widespread use of the word in the compound adjective self-deprecating has helped bolster this use of the verb.
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(third-person singular simple present deprecates, present participle deprecating, simple past and past participle deprecated)
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To make invalid or obsolete by removing or flagging the item. When commands or statements in a language are planned for deletion in future releases of the compiler or rendering engine, they are said to be deprecated. Programmers should begin to remove them from the source code in subsequent revisions of their programs. See flagging and nugatory.
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