squalid

[ skwol-id, skwaw-lid ]

adjective

1. foul and repulsive, as from lack of care or cleanliness; neglected and filthy.

   Synonyms: unclean

2. wretched; miserable; degraded; sordid.

squalid

/ ˈskwɒlɪd; skwɒˈlɪdɪtɪ /

adjective

1. dirty and repulsive, esp as a result of neglect or poverty
2. sordid

Derived Forms

• squalidity, noun
• ˈsqualidly, adverb

Other Words From

• squalid·ly adverb
• squalid·ness squa·lid·i·ty [skwo-, lid, -i-tee], noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of squalid¹

1585–95; < Latin squālidus dirty, equivalent to squāl ( ēre ) to be dirty, encrusted + -idus -id ⁴

Word History and Origins

Origin of squalid¹

C16: from Latin squālidus, from squālēre to be stiff with dirt

Synonym Study

See dirty.

Example Sentences

“The Mexican migra has detained us multiple times, taken away our cellphones, beat us up, and sent us back to the south,” said Yancarlis Caldera, 29, one of hundreds of migrants camped out in a squalid tent city outside the colonial-era Roman Catholic Church of Santa Cruz and Solitude in Mexico City.

From Los Angeles Times

In 2022, a Times investigation found that California’s massive illegal marijuana market pushes legal growers toward financial ruin, exacerbates community violence, causes massive amounts of environmental degradation and forces laborers to toil in squalid and often dangerous conditions.

From Los Angeles Times

Illegal cannabis farms are engulfing parts of California and exploiting farmworkers who labor in squalid, deadly conditions, a Times investigation finds.

From Los Angeles Times

Bear in mind that for migrants, conditions of impoverishment and/or violence in their native countries are apparently so intolerable that they decide their best option is to make a lengthy trip through a desert, on foot, that has a good chance of ending with deportation back to their original home or “removal” to the makeshift northern Mexico tent camps that the Times’ reporting has described as “squalid” and “filthy.”

From Slate

Before then, the influence of political Christianity was perhaps strongest in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, as rapid industrialization, widening economic inequality and mass migration into squalid urban centers impelled Christians to think deeply about poverty and class —and what role their faith had to play in alleviating those problems.

From Salon

Related Words

• dingy
• fetid
• filthy
• grimy
• muddy
• musty
• ramshackle
• seedy
• shabby
• sordid
• wretched