son of a bitch
noun
Simple meaning
A suffering person deemed deserving of compassion.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
suhnuhvuhbichSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈsʌnəvəbɪtʃ
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.
noun
often preceded by "poor"
A suffering person deemed deserving of compassion.
(derogatory or offensive, slang, vulgar, usually referring specifically to a man, chiefly US, Canada) An objectionable, despicable person.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A suffering person deemed deserving of compassion.
Used this way, son of a bitch is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly unfavourable pull. It sounds natural in ordinary conversation and in expressive writing alike.
- Emotional tone
- Negative
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Serious and weighty
- Usage feel
- Everyday but emotionally strong
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
Share your sentence
Ask Vocabaura
Understand the word your way.
What Does It Mean Here?
Words can change meaning depending on context.
Use it yourself
Keep learning “son of a bitch” by choosing the kind of practice you need next.
- Practice sentence writingWrite sentences with vocabulary and get instant feedback.
- Practice in contextAnswer short vocabulary questions drawn from real situations.
- Review vocabularyTest your recall and strengthen words over time.
- Practice typingType vocabulary from meanings, examples and other prompts.
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.