wise-ass
Americanadjective
noun
Etymology
Origin of wise-ass
First recorded in 1970–75
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“If there’s some wise-ass article, if there’s something critical about my hair or makeup or what I wore, he doesn’t tell me.”
From Los Angeles Times • Jan. 7, 2024
That Cusack’s wise-ass cynic will get rattled and unravel is a given.
From The Guardian • Aug. 22, 2019
This must have been where the exile story started: Buckner chased west by one wise-ass too many.
From The New Yorker • May 28, 2019
As the music strikes up, and the book’s characters are introduced in comic buffo style, you wonder if you’re in for a meal of wise-ass lit-lampoonery.
From Seattle Times • Jul. 11, 2013
Lee even briefly reprises the role of Mookie, Do the Right Thing’s wise-ass pizza deliveryman—though anyone hoping, like me, for an update on Mookie’s life over the past two decades will be left hanging.
From Slate • Aug. 10, 2012
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
