Pejorative

A word or phrase is a pejorative (occasionally misspelled perjorative) if it expresses contempt or disapproval. The adjective pejorative is synonymous with derogatory and dyslogistic (noun: dyslogism) (antonyms: meliorative, eulogistic, noun eulogism). Dyslogisms such as "pea-brain" and "bottom-feeder" are words and phrases essentially pejorative by their nature. Although pejorative (adj.) means much the same thing as disparaging, the latter term may be applied to a look or gesture as well as to spoken language— in the evocative languages of gesture, it is not easy to distinguish a disparaging gesture from a dismissive or merely skeptical one, however.

See also

• list of ethnic slurs
• list of pejorative political slogans
• list of sexual slurs