Definition

Unnerving refers to something that causes anxiety, fear, or discomfort, making a person feel uneasy or disturbed.

Pronunciation

US English

UK English


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Excerpts from News Articles

That these ideas were conceived by Black minds — more specifically, Black minds awakened and unnerved by the fact they were often seen as inferior to white people — only seems to make conservatives more resolute in banning them.

Logo 2023-02-08 MSNBC News

In the absence of a body or the good sense to conclude that Holt had probably drowned, “yellow peril”-fuelled conspiracy theories flourished. Countless unnerved Australians, like me, were conditioned to treat them seriously.

Logo 2023-03-27 Al Jazeera

Much like the film, Yorke went in an opposite and more destabilising direction, conjuring a succession of eerie orchestral compositions and ballads that often (distractingly) feel like unreleased Radiohead tracks from their last album to date, 2016’s 'A Moon Shaped Pool'. Ultimately, both the richly layered film and the unnerving soundtrack take some time to get used to, but with repeated watches and listens, it’s plain to see and hear that 2018’s vintage was not only radically different but also richer and, dare we say it, superior.

Logo 2023-04-03 EURO News

Grady Hendrix's work occupies a unique interstitial space between emotional storytelling, unnerving , gory horror, and a dash of comedy. His latest, How to Sell a Haunted House, fully embraces all the elements readers have come to love about what he does .

Logo 2023-04-04 Literary Hub

More than 20 agreements are expected to be signed on the rescheduled trip, ranging from investments in renewable energy to co-operation on science and technology. Marina Silva, Brazil’s environment minister, told The Economist that a priority is to seek investments in the renewables sector, particularly in green hydrogen, a fuel that can be made using solar and wind power. Another closely watched area will be satellites. That could unnerve the United States, which worries that they could be used to monitor military activity.

Logo 2023-04-10 The Economist

As part of the investigation, police descended on the neighborhood where the suspect lived, about 5 miles (8 kilometers) south of the downtown shooting. The street was blocked as federal and local officers talked to residents. One home was cordoned off with caution tape. Kami Cooper, who lives in the neighborhood, said she didn’t recall ever meeting the suspect but said it’s an unnerving feeling to have lived on the same street as someone who could do such a thing.

Logo 2023-04-10 Associated Press

The thought of spending 10 days in utter silence without devices, entertainment, hot showers, and even dinners is unnerving for many people. Yet it’s become an annual ritual for some. Before the pandemic struck, I had the pleasure of joining them for a Vipassana meditation camp.

Logo 2023-04-10 Channel NewsAsia

Throughout Donald Trump’s presidency, the Republican White House embraced the “Friday night news dump” with unnerving enthusiasm. If it was a Friday night ahead of a holiday weekend, the public was even more likely to see — or if the strategy was executed effectively, not see — a provocative announcement.

Logo 2023-04-10 MSNBC News

Not everyone saw through the act. The Reddit user “Lanky_Grade_268,” who said he is a 21-year-old hotel cleaner in Argentina, had called Claudia “beautiful and charming” and said he was unnerved by the revelation she might be fake. “It is scary because it will be difficult to distinguish between an AI and a real person,” he said in a message.

Logo 2023-04-11 The Washington Post

Twenty years ago, the poet, essayist and playwright Claudia Rankine, hailed for Citizen – an original, unnerving and unforgettable scrutiny of racism in the US and winner of the 2015 Forward prize – was involved in a more inward undertaking. She had been reading Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse – and Woolf seems to have become for her, as happens to many readers, a muse of sorts.

Logo 2023-04-11 The Guardian

The choice to position alongside the recollection of this fire a fictional blaze that happens on the same night might surprise – perhaps even unnerve – readers. This second fire is at the Kilburn home of Cornelius Pitt, estranged father of Melissa, one of the characters in Ordinary People.

Logo 2023-04-12 The Guardian

But the central bank has had to cut reserve requirements to spur lending, extremely low inflation points to weak demand in the economy, and Beijing's closeness to Russia and hawkishness on Taiwan continues to unnerve global investors.

Logo 2023-04-13 Channel NewsAsia

They said he repeatedly shared classified documents on the internet through a gaming group he belonged to that focused on war, guns, and sometimes, racist and antisemitic memes. It was a remarkable turnabout for a young man who grew up with a passion for the military and weapons — at times to an unnerving extent, some who knew him said.

Logo 2023-04-15 The New York Times

Quant, who is also credited with the invention of the mini skirt, re-imagined hum-drum pantyhose in garish patterns, bright washes and glittery finishes. "When I was 13, I sat down and had a good cry about the business of growing up," she told a US newspaper in 1976. "What really unnerved me was the awful realization that grown-up dressing was grotesque and drab. I wanted to evade the entire issue of adulthood by wearing childlike clothes forever."

Logo 2023-04-15 CNN News

The Manhattan police outpost, court papers say, was overseen by the Fuzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau, a branch of China’s Ministry of Public Security. It is one of scores of such operations around the world that have unnerved diplomats and intelligence officials.

Logo 2023-04-17 The New York Times

While Kishida was evacuated unharmed, the attack sent a wave of unnerving déjà vu over Abe’s assassination during a campaign speech in the western city of Nara. Abe’s death horrified a nation that is rarely associated with political and gun violence.

Logo 2023-04-17 CNN News

Prosecutors say the two defendants – ‘HARRY’ LU JIANWANG and CHEN JINPING — established a secret police station in a Manhattan office building, under the guidance of China’s Ministry of Public Security. The pair are charged with conspiring to act as agents of Beijing’s government and obstruction of justice, according to an unsealed complaint from the Department of Justice. The outpost was one of more than 100 Chinese police operations around the world that have unnerved intelligence officials and American diplomats.

Logo 2023-04-17 Politico

But if we’re still capable of being roused from this ethical stupor, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah is a writer with sufficient energy to do it. In 2018, his first book, “Friday Black,” offered an unnerving collection of dystopian stories that satirized the interplay of racism and consumerism. The title story imagined the worst possible Black Friday sale in a shopping mall. “Zimmer Land,” one of several unforgettable pieces, described an amusement park where White people can experience the thrill of shooting Black people they think are threatening them.

Logo 2023-04-19 The Washington Post

In the recent SNP leadership election, the outsider Ash Regan wore practically nothing but the fabric. Ian Blackford has in the past unnerved many a viewer when he bent down in his kilt to lay a wreath at the Cenotaph. And Nicola Sturgeon even wore a tartan face mask during the pandemic.

Logo 2023-04-19 The Spectator

DeSantis's mixed messaging on U.S. support for Ukraine, his reluctance to respond forcefully to Trump's attacks on him and his poorer showing in some national and key state polls have unnerved allies and donors.

Logo 2023-04-21 Reuters

Altman is better-known these days leading a revolution in artificial intelligence, helming the firm that mesmerized and unnerved much of the public with the release of a chatbot that could, at a prompt, churn out humanlike text. But he still sees unrealized potential in psychedelics and eagerly backed Journey’s mission.

Logo 2023-04-22 The Washington Post

The aesthetician had applied her needle with all the care and precision of someone stabbing the film lid of a microwave meal with a fork. Unnerved , I’d run to her bathroom and discovered five raised pustules of Botox on my forehead, bleeding slightly at each wound. Concerned that she may have immobilised my face, I’d taken a video in selfie mode, attempting a variety of expressions: scrunching my eyes, baring my teeth, performing a dead-eyed grimace.

Logo 2023-04-22 The Guardian

The more powerful these activist movements become, the more dangerous they are. Not only are many of their preachings ideologically unnerving – such as repeated demands to remove gendered language from medical environments where accuracy is crucial – but they have become dangerous in the real world where debate has turned into intimidation, threats, and abuse.

Logo 2023-04-22 The Spectator

When the former miners realised that the reenactors playing the police were unnerved by them, they played up to it

Logo 2023-04-23 The Guardian

Although China's foreign ministry attempted to row back by saying Beijing respects the sovereignty and integrity of all countries - despite its refusal to condemn Russia's invasion of Ukraine - the row will unnerve many investors wary of Beijing's support for Moscow and position on its right to Taiwan.

Logo 2023-04-24 Reuters

The lack of eye contact can be unnerving for pedestrians, as well as parents who teach their kids to make sure they have a driver’s attention before walking in front of them. Waving, looking, smiling and nodding are mostly useless with driverless cars. They have to be replaced by a blind trust that the car’s systems will spot you.

Logo 2023-04-24 The Washington Post

Where I live in New York, city officials have mostly kept driverless test cars off the streets. When I visit San Francisco, I feel unnerved seeing driverless test cars but also grateful.

Logo 2023-04-25 The Washington Post

The debt ceiling stalemate has unnerved some Democrats in Congress, who worry that the two sides have gotten no closer to a resolution in the nearly three months since Biden first met with McCarthy and as financial experts warn that lawmakers may only have until June to avert default. Shortly after the bill passed, three moderate Democrats — Reps. Jared Golden, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez and Mary Peltola — sent a letter to Biden and McCarthy pleading with them to start talks.

Logo 2023-04-26 Politico

Rushing, 59, wished the help could have came when she needed it most, when her children were young. But she could still use it, she said, pulling a second document — a recent delinquency notice after falling behind on her rent — out of her folder of papers. Her carpal tunnel was worsening in her hands, she said, causing her to sometimes miss work as a cook even though she could not afford to. The thought of returning to a shelter unnerved her.

Logo 2023-04-26 The Washington Post

Only weeks ago, the solar tariffs legislation — now headed for a House vote on Friday — was largely dismissed as a GOP messaging bill, a measure lawmakers could pass knowing Biden would veto it. While Biden still plans to block it, the growing Democratic support for it is unnerving clean tech executives, who are now bracing for similar bills to follow.

Logo 2023-04-27 The Washington Post

SYDNEY: Asian shares extended losses on Thursday (Apr 27) as troubles at US lender First Republic Bank continued to unnerve investors amid concerns that growth in the world's biggest economy could very well surprise to the downside.

Logo 2023-04-27 Channel NewsAsia

The most recent was while on an international trade mission in Japan this week. Reporters asked DeSantis about his lagging poll numbers. In a moment that went viral, DeSantis was visibly unnerved by the questions and seemed unable to respond in a way that appeared prepared.

Logo 2023-04-27 MSNBC News

The film’s true power is its ability to convey an unnerving truth about the sneakers’ mystique: Jordan’s athletic ability was crucial to the success of Nike and Air Jordan; not so much his face – and definitely not his words.

Logo 2023-04-28 The Conversation

However, Minchin has found himself out of step with aspects of his own politics. When he speaks about making geographic relocations, he says: “There’s something fundamentally difficult about not knowing where home is.” I sense he no longer knows where his political home is. And this unnerves him. Time and again as we talk, Minchin returns to the subject of modern progressivism and his gradual unmooring from it. “I keep watching liberals assert stuff. And there’s this backfire effect. There are unintended consequences to the pushing-through of our ideals.

Logo 2023-04-29 The Guardian