I. hurt 1 S1 W2 /hɜːt $ hɜːrt/ BrE AmE verb ( past tense and past participle hurt )
[ Word Family: noun : ↑ hurt , ↑ hurtfulness ; adjective : ↑ hurt ≠ ↑ unhurt , ↑ hurtful ; verb : ↑ hurt ; adverb : ↑ hurtfully ]
[ Date: 1100-1200 ; Language: Old French ; Origin: hurter 'to crash violently into' ]
1 . INJURE SOMEBODY [transitive] to injure yourself or someone else:
Was anyone hurt in the accident?
Put that thing down – you might hurt someone with it.
hurt your arm/leg/nose etc
He hurt his knee playing football.
hurt yourself
Be careful you don’t fall and hurt yourself.
2 . FEEL PAIN [intransitive] to feel pain in part of your body ⇨ ache :
My back hurts.
Where does it hurt?
It hurts when I try to move my leg.
hurt like hell informal (=hurt very much)
My shoulder hurts like hell.
3 . CAUSE PAIN [transitive] to cause pain in a part of your body:
The sun’s hurting my eyes.
4 . INSULT SOMEBODY [intransitive and transitive] to make someone feel very upset, unhappy, sad etc:
I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.
it hurts (somebody) to do something
What hurts is that he never even said goodbye.
It hurt me to think that you hated me.
5 . BAD EFFECT [transitive] to have a bad effect on someone or something, especially by making them less successful or powerful:
Foreign competition has hurt the company’s position in the market.
6 . be hurting American English
a) informal to feel very upset or unhappy about something:
Martha’s going through a divorce and really hurting right now.
b) if a group, organization etc is hurting, they do not have something important that they need
be hurting for
The team is hurting for quarterbacks.
7 . something won’t/doesn’t hurt spoken said when you think someone should do something or that something is a good idea:
The house looks pretty good, but a fresh paint job wouldn’t hurt either.
it won’t/doesn’t hurt (somebody) to do something
It won’t hurt Julia to get up early for a change.
• • •
THESAURUS
■ to injure yourself or someone else
▪ hurt to damage part of your body, or someone else’s body:
She slipped on the ice and hurt herself badly.
|
Be careful you don’t hurt anyone with that knife.
▪ injure to hurt yourself quite severely, or to be hurt in an accident or fighting:
One of our players has injured his leg, and will be out of the game for weeks.
|
Four people have been seriously injured on the Arizona highway.
▪ wound to deliberately hurt someone using a weapon such as a knife or gun:
The gunmen shot and killed twelve people and wounded three others.
▪ maim /meɪm/ [usually passive] to hurt someone very severely, especially so that they lose an arm, leg etc, often as the result of an explosion:
In countries where there are landmines, people are killed and maimed daily.
▪ break to hurt a part of your body by breaking a bone in it:
The X-ray showed that I had broken my wrist.
▪ bruise to hurt a part of your body when you fall on it or hit it, causing a dark mark to appear on your skin:
Cathy fell off her bike and bruised her legs badly.
▪ sprain/twist to hurt your knee, wrist, shoulder etc by suddenly twisting it while you are moving:
I jumped down from the wall and landed awkwardly, spraining my ankle.
▪ strain/pull to hurt one of your muscles by stretching it or using it too much:
When you are lifting heavy loads, be careful not to strain a back muscle.
▪ dislocate to damage a joint in your body in a way that moves the two parts of the joint out of their normal position:
Our best batsman dislocated his shoulder during training.
▪ paralyse [usually passive] to make someone lose the ability to move part or all of their body:
A climbing accident had left him paralysed from the chest down.
■ when part of your body feels painful
▪ hurt if part of your body hurts, it feels painful:
My chest hurts when I cough.
▪ ache to hurt with a continuous pain:
I’d been walking all day and my legs were really aching.
▪ throb to feel a bad pain that comes and goes again in a regular and continuous way:
Lou had a terrible headache and his whole head seemed to be throbbing.
▪ sting to feel a sharp pain, or to make someone feel this, especially in your eyes, throat, or skin:
My throat stings every time I swallow.
|
This injection may sting a little.
▪ smart to hurt with a sudden sharp pain – used especially about your eyes, or your skin where something has hit you:
Her eyes were smarting from the thick smoke.
|
Jackson’s face was still smarting from the punch.
▪ burn to feel very hot and painful or uncomfortable:
Be careful because this chemical will make your skin burn.
|
His eyes were burning because of the gas.
▪ pinch if something you are wearing pinches you, it is too tight and presses painfully on your skin:
The shirt was a bit too small and it was pinching my neck.
▪ something is killing me spoken informal used when something feels very painful:
My legs are killing me.
|
These shoes are killing me.
▪ a bad back/leg/arm etc if you have a bad back/leg/arm etc, it feels painful:
He’s off work with a bad back.
II. hurt 2 BrE AmE adjective
[ Word Family: noun : ↑ hurt , ↑ hurtfulness ; adjective : ↑ hurt ≠ ↑ unhurt , ↑ hurtful ; verb : ↑ hurt ; adverb : ↑ hurtfully ]
1 . [not usually before noun] suffering pain or injury SYN injured
badly/seriously hurt
Fortunately, no one was seriously hurt.
Sometimes players get hurt in training.
2 . very upset or unhappy because someone has said or done something unkind, dishonest, or unfair:
Rachel felt hurt and betrayed.
He’s no good for you, Jenny. You’ll only get hurt again.
his hurt pride
She wore a hurt expression on her face.
very/deeply hurt
Alice was deeply hurt that she hadn’t been invited.
• • •
THESAURUS
▪ upset [not before noun] unhappy and worried because something unpleasant or disappointing has happened:
Miss Hurley is too upset to speak to anyone at the moment.
|
She’s still deeply upset about her uncle’s death.
|
He’s upset that he didn’t get an invitation to their wedding.
▪ hurt upset and shocked because someone has been unkind to you, especially someone that you trusted and thought was a friend:
Bill felt deeply hurt when he realized she had lied to him.
|
Gretta was really hurt that none of her friends came to visit her in the hospital.
|
Jackson was said to be ‘deeply hurt’ by the newspaper reports about him.
|
He had a hurt expression on his face.
▪ distressed very upset:
Priests have been counselling distressed relatives of the victims.
|
She was visibly distressed after hearing of her husband’s accident.
|
Matilda was too distressed to speak.
▪ distraught written so upset and worried that you are unable to do normal things, and nothing can make you feel calm:
Benson was so distraught over the breakup of his marriage that he felt like committing suicide.
|
The distraught parents of the missing baby have made a public appeal for her return.
▪ in a (terrible) state British English informal so upset that you cannot stop crying:
She called me one night in a terrible state, saying she wanted to die.
|
I could see that she was in a bit of a state.
▪ be worked up informal to be very upset or angry, so that you think things are worse than they really are:
I was too worked up to sleep.
|
It’s not worth getting worked up about. Anyone can make a mistake.
III. hurt 3 BrE AmE noun [uncountable and countable]
[ Word Family: noun : ↑ hurt , ↑ hurtfulness ; adjective : ↑ hurt ≠ ↑ unhurt , ↑ hurtful ; verb : ↑ hurt ; adverb : ↑ hurtfully ]
a feeling of great unhappiness because someone, especially someone you trust, has treated you badly or unfairly:
She saw the hurt in his eyes.
all the hurts and wrongs of the past
⇨ harm