tenuous

English

Etymology

Irregularly formed from Latin tenuis (“thin, slight”) +‎ -ous. Compare tenuious.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtɛn.ju.əs/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛnjuəs
• Homophone: tenuis (when "tenuous" includes /j/ and its unstressed /ɪ/ = [ə])
• Hyphenation: tenu‧ous

Adjective

tenuous (comparative more tenuous, superlative most tenuous)

1. Thin in substance or consistency.

   Synonyms: delicate, gossamer; see also Thesaurus:fragile

   The aether was thought to be of tenuous strands.

   Far from being amicable, the numbers seemed to turn their backs on each other, and I couldn't find a pair with even the most tenuous connection.

2. Insubstantial.

   Synonyms: ethereal; see also Thesaurus:insubstantial

   His argument was not convincing in the debate, considering how tenuous it was.

   • July 18 2012, Scott Tobias, AV Club The Dark Knight Rises

     Picking up eight years after The Dark Knight left off, the film finds Gotham enjoying a tenuous peace based on Harvey Dent’s moral ideals rather than the ugly truth of his demise.

3. Precarious, dependent upon unreliable things.
   • 1994, M. Lindsey Kaplan, Katherine Eggert, ““Good queen, my lord, good queen” - Sexual Slander and the Trials of Female Authority in “The Winter's Tale””, in Renaissance Drama‎, volume 25, →DOI, page 110 of 89–118:

     Paulina's repeated, almost anxious iteration of the lawfulness of her actions serves as a reminder of women's tenuous stance before the law in early modern English society.

   • 1996 September, “Moral Clashes”, in Gay Community News, page 4:

     Is this connected to "pro-gay" Governor Weld's contract with some in the community—gay rights in exchange for keeping sex out of the picture? Those willing to make this 'bargain with the devil' depend for their tenuous status on keeping the rest of us in line, moralizing about the need to behave "beyond reproach," clarifying to the straight public that there are good gays and bad ones.

Derived terms

• tenuosity
• tenuously
• tenuousness

Related terms

• attenuate
• extenuate
• tenuities
• tenuity

Translations

thin in substance or consistency

Bulgarian: тънък (bg) (tǎnǎk), слаб (bg) (slab) Catalan: tènue (ca) m or f Chinese: Mandarin: 弱勢 / 弱势 (zh) (ruòshì) Dutch: onbelangrijk (nl), dunnetjes (nl) Finnish: hatara (fi), puutteellinen (fi) French: ténu (fr) German: (please verify) nicht stichhaltig , dünn (de), prekär (de), heikel (de), dürftig (de), fein (de), zart (de), schlank (de), klein (de), spärlich (de), unsicher (de), verdünnt (de) Portuguese: ténue (pt) (Portugal), tênue (pt) (Brazil) Russian: то́нкий (ru) (tónkij), жи́дкий (ru) (žídkij) Spanish: tenue (es) Walloon: tene (wa) m or f

insubstantial

Bulgarian: несъществен (bg) (nesǎštestven) German: schwach (de), dürftig (de), nicht stichhaltig, unwesentlich (de), unbedeutend (de), angreifbar (de) Russian: несуще́ственный (ru) m (nesuščéstvennyj), несуще́ственная (ru) f (nesuščéstvennaja), несуще́ственное (ru) n (nesuščéstvennoje)

See also

• tendrilous
• wispy