devil may care
n
Simple meaning
An American Thoroughbred racehorse.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
dehvuhlmaykerSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈdɛvəlmeɪkɛɹ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
n
May 72007 – May 42011
An American Thoroughbred racehorse.
Devil-May-Care (spelled Devil May Care in later editions) is a novel of romantic suspense published by Elizabeth Peters in 1977.
A James Bond continuation novel written by Sebastian Faulks.
An American adult animated comedy television series created by Emmy Award winner Douglas Goldstein (Robot Chicken) and starring Alan Tudyk and Asif Ali.
also rereleased as lullaby of the leaves
The debut album by American jazz vocalist Teri Thornton featuring tracks recorded in late 1960 and early 1961 for the Riverside label.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: (May 7, 2007 – May 4, 2011) an American Thoroughbred racehorse.
Used this way, devil may care is a specialist word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in technical or specialist writing contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Clinical and technical
- Usage feel
- Technical and specialized
Where it naturally appears
- Technical/specialist writing
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.