Mute
adjective
Unable to speak, often because of a physical or biological condition.
He is mute due to a vocal cord injury

Often appears as...
- mute person
- mute child
noun
A device used to soften or muffle the sound of a musical instrument.
She uses a mute to soften the sound of her trumpet

Often appears as...
- trumpet mute
- violin mute
Usage tips
Technical
verb
To silence or reduce the volume of sound.
Please mute your microphone while not speaking

Often appears as...
- mute microphone
- mute television
Usage tips
Technical
adjective
Not expressing or showing feelings or emotion.
His face was mute as he listened to the news

Often appears as...
- mute astonishment
- mute terror
Usage tips
Formal
Literary
adjective
Unable to speak, often because of a physical or biological condition.
He is mute due to a vocal cord injury

Often appears as...
- mute person
- mute child
noun
A device used to soften or muffle the sound of a musical instrument.
She uses a mute to soften the sound of her trumpet

Often appears as...
- trumpet mute
- violin mute
Usage tips
Technical
verb
To silence or reduce the volume of sound.
Please mute your microphone while not speaking

Often appears as...
- mute microphone
- mute television
Usage tips
Technical
adjective
Not expressing or showing feelings or emotion.
His face was mute as he listened to the news

Often appears as...
- mute astonishment
- mute terror
Usage tips
Formal
Literary
Definition 1 of 4

Beyond Disability
Mute can imply a condition or choice but doesn't define someone's intelligence or abilities.

Though mute, she communicated through sign language brilliantly.
Not Silence By Choice
Using 'mute' suggests the person cannot speak, not that they're simply silent.

The injury left him mute, but he still enjoyed listening to stories.
Sensitive Descriptions
Be respectful, 'mute' describes a condition. Use person-first language when possible.

She is a person who is mute, not just a 'mute person'.
Beyond Disability
Mute can imply a condition or choice but doesn't define someone's intelligence or abilities.

Though mute, she communicated through sign language brilliantly.
Not Silence By Choice
Using 'mute' suggests the person cannot speak, not that they're simply silent.

The injury left him mute, but he still enjoyed listening to stories.
Sensitive Descriptions
Be respectful, 'mute' describes a condition. Use person-first language when possible.

She is a person who is mute, not just a 'mute person'.
Beyond Disability
Mute can imply a condition or choice but doesn't define someone's intelligence or abilities.

Though mute, she communicated through sign language brilliantly.
Not Silence By Choice
Using 'mute' suggests the person cannot speak, not that they're simply silent.

The injury left him mute, but he still enjoyed listening to stories.
Sensitive Descriptions
Be respectful, 'mute' describes a condition. Use person-first language when possible.

She is a person who is mute, not just a 'mute person'.
Video examples
Using poetry as a way to...
treat speech like an intruder that would make fool of me in a room filled with people salad silence stays a sit-in in my mouth by age four my parents did not call it mute they called it shy called me a wind of a boy a breeze that would pick up conversation eventually that my
Video examples
Three ideas. Three...
in my late 20s, and despite being a pathologically shy virtual mute with low self-esteem who'd never held a microphone before, I knew as soon as I walked and stood in front of the audience, I knew, before I'd even landed my first joke, I knew that I really liked stand-up,
Video examples
Mind-blowing, magnified...
Sometimes I wish I had the eyes of a child. And by that I mean, I wish I could look at the world in the same as I did when I was a small boy. I think there is a danger, as we get older, that our curiosity becomes slightly muted or dulled by familiarity.
Video examples
How My Mind Came Back to...
Your personality appears to vanish into a heavy fog and all of your emotions and desires are constricted, stifled and muted within you. For me, the worst was the feeling of utter powerlessness. I simply existed. It's a very dark place to find yourself
Video examples
Daniel Libeskind's 17...
that gives meaning to architecture. And, of course, expressive spaces are not mute. Expressive spaces are not spaces that simply confirm what we already know. Expressive spaces may disturb us. And I think that's also part of life.
Video examples
What we learn before...
because sounds from the outside world have to travel through the mother's abdominal tissue and through the amniotic fluid that surrounds the fetus the voices fetuses here starting around the fourth month of gestation are muted
Video examples
Anant Agarwal: Why...
They can hit the pause button. They can rewind the professor. Heck, they can even mute the professor. So this form of self-pacing can be very helpful to learning. The third idea that we have is instant feedback.
Video examples
Lopburi Monkey Festival...
from and indulge even statues of monkeys get trays of colorful food and a bottle of water the sponsor of all this monkey business mr. young mute knows how to make an entrance
Video examples
How to build (and...
I have been tempted at every step of my career, tempted personally and tempted by coaching of others, to mute who I am in the world. I'm a woman of super strong opinions,
Video examples
Nature's First Line of...
here in dorset hundreds of mute swans gather each year to breed
Video examples
Using poetry as a way to...
treat speech like an intruder that would make fool of me in a room filled with people salad silence stays a sit-in in my mouth by age four my parents did not call it mute they called it shy called me a wind of a boy a breeze that would pick up conversation eventually that my
Video examples
Three ideas. Three...
in my late 20s, and despite being a pathologically shy virtual mute with low self-esteem who'd never held a microphone before, I knew as soon as I walked and stood in front of the audience, I knew, before I'd even landed my first joke, I knew that I really liked stand-up,
Video examples
Mind-blowing, magnified...
Sometimes I wish I had the eyes of a child. And by that I mean, I wish I could look at the world in the same as I did when I was a small boy. I think there is a danger, as we get older, that our curiosity becomes slightly muted or dulled by familiarity.
Video examples
How My Mind Came Back to...
Your personality appears to vanish into a heavy fog and all of your emotions and desires are constricted, stifled and muted within you. For me, the worst was the feeling of utter powerlessness. I simply existed. It's a very dark place to find yourself
Video examples
Daniel Libeskind's 17...
that gives meaning to architecture. And, of course, expressive spaces are not mute. Expressive spaces are not spaces that simply confirm what we already know. Expressive spaces may disturb us. And I think that's also part of life.
Video examples
What we learn before...
because sounds from the outside world have to travel through the mother's abdominal tissue and through the amniotic fluid that surrounds the fetus the voices fetuses here starting around the fourth month of gestation are muted
Video examples
Anant Agarwal: Why...
They can hit the pause button. They can rewind the professor. Heck, they can even mute the professor. So this form of self-pacing can be very helpful to learning. The third idea that we have is instant feedback.
Video examples
Lopburi Monkey Festival...
from and indulge even statues of monkeys get trays of colorful food and a bottle of water the sponsor of all this monkey business mr. young mute knows how to make an entrance
Video examples
How to build (and...
I have been tempted at every step of my career, tempted personally and tempted by coaching of others, to mute who I am in the world. I'm a woman of super strong opinions,
Video examples
Nature's First Line of...
here in dorset hundreds of mute swans gather each year to breed
Example 1 of 10
Quote examples
Angie Martinez
American Musician
If you are a woman with this full life who is incredibly ambitious like I am, you have to find somebody who is into it, respects it, encourages it, and celebrates it because he loves that about you. Otherwise, you're going to feel like you're muting yourself.

Quote examples
Banks
American Musician
Music is almost like a therapy for me. It helps keep me centered and think straight. Before I discovered it, I was walking around, and it felt like there were 25 extra pounds of gravity on my shoulders. It's like you're mute or something.

Quote examples
Maya Angelou
American Poet
When I was 8 years old I became a mute and was a mute until I was 13, and I thought of my whole body as an ear, so I can go into a crowd and sit still and absorb all sound. That talent or ability has lasted and served me until today.

Quote examples
Maria Montessori
Italian Educator
Books are mute as far as sound is concerned. It follows that reading aloud is a combination of two distinct operations, of two 'languages.' It is something far more complex than speaking and reading taken separately by themselves.

Quote examples
Michael Emerson
American Actor
I'd really like to play a character who's inarticulate. I always play people with language. It would be good to play a mute or a fool or a saint.

Quote examples
Jennifer Palmieri
American Public Servant
I think that crying is a way women and men express frustration, anger, or passion. And we should not feel compelled to mute those emotions.

Quote examples
Bill Irwin
American Entertainer
It's shocking to think of the universe now without Robin Williams' energy, even muted.

Quote examples
Kate Millett
American Activist
I'm slammed with an identity that can no longer say a word; mute with responsibility.

Quote examples
Robert Browning
English Poet
Autumn wins you best by this its mute appeal to sympathy for its decay.

Quote examples
Ralph Waldo Emerson
American Philosopher
What is a farm but a mute gospel?

Quote examples
Angie Martinez
American Musician
If you are a woman with this full life who is incredibly ambitious like I am, you have to find somebody who is into it, respects it, encourages it, and celebrates it because he loves that about you. Otherwise, you're going to feel like you're muting yourself.

Quote examples
Banks
American Musician
Music is almost like a therapy for me. It helps keep me centered and think straight. Before I discovered it, I was walking around, and it felt like there were 25 extra pounds of gravity on my shoulders. It's like you're mute or something.

Quote examples
Maya Angelou
American Poet
When I was 8 years old I became a mute and was a mute until I was 13, and I thought of my whole body as an ear, so I can go into a crowd and sit still and absorb all sound. That talent or ability has lasted and served me until today.

Quote examples
Maria Montessori
Italian Educator
Books are mute as far as sound is concerned. It follows that reading aloud is a combination of two distinct operations, of two 'languages.' It is something far more complex than speaking and reading taken separately by themselves.

Quote examples
Michael Emerson
American Actor
I'd really like to play a character who's inarticulate. I always play people with language. It would be good to play a mute or a fool or a saint.

Quote examples
Jennifer Palmieri
American Public Servant
I think that crying is a way women and men express frustration, anger, or passion. And we should not feel compelled to mute those emotions.

Quote examples
Bill Irwin
American Entertainer
It's shocking to think of the universe now without Robin Williams' energy, even muted.

Quote examples
Kate Millett
American Activist
I'm slammed with an identity that can no longer say a word; mute with responsibility.

Quote examples
Robert Browning
English Poet
Autumn wins you best by this its mute appeal to sympathy for its decay.

Quote examples
Ralph Waldo Emerson
American Philosopher
What is a farm but a mute gospel?

Example 1 of 10
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