stuffy

See also: stuffie

English

Etymology

From stuff +‎ -y.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈstʌfi/
• Rhymes: -ʌfi

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Adjective

stuffy (comparative stuffier, superlative stuffiest)

1. Poorly ventilated; partially plugged.

   Synonym: fusty

   I can’t smell very well today – I have a stuffy nose.

   Let’s go outside – it’s getting stuffy in here.

2. Uncomfortably warm without sufficient air circulation.

   Synonym: oppressive

   • Abby Jimenez

     Like my life was a stuffy room, and you’re the breeze that came in when the window opened.

   • 1941 August, C. Hamilton Ellis, “The English Station”, in Railway Magazine, page 358:

     If Euston is not typically English, St. Pancras is. Its façade is a nightmare of improbable Gothic. It is fairly plastered with the aesthetic ideals of 1868, and the only beautiful thing about it is Barlow's roof. It is haunted by the stuffier kind of ghost. Yet there is something about the ordered whole of St. Pancras that would make demolition a terrible pity.

   • 1988 May 6, Michael Miner, “"Chicago Times" Reaches for the Cutting Edge; Nicole Drieske Goes Public; Harry Golden”, in Chicago Reader‎^[1]:

     We all sat in stuffy classrooms and had men in tweedy sportscoats ruin our afternoons.

3. Stout; mettlesome; resolute.
4. (US) Angry and obstinate; sulky.
5. Boring, uninteresting, over-formal, pompous, very conventional.

   The stuffy professor droned on as the class lost interest.

   • 2017 May 15, Hannah Marriott, “Woke models: how activism became fashion's latest must-have”, in The Guardian‎^[2], London, page 9:

     It could be argued that the rise of the socially conscious model reflects a very 2017 archetype: the “woke” young woman, who looks set to define femininity this decade in the same way that the lager-swilling ladette did in the 90s. It is also symptomatic of a broader cultural “awokening” that has reached the stuffiest institutions; even the royal family has recently relaxed its upper lip.

6. (Scotland) Stout; sturdy.

Derived terms

• stuffily
• stuffiness

Related terms

• stuffed shirt

Translations

poorly ventilated

• Armenian: տոթ (hy) (totʻ)
• Bashkir: тынсыу (tınsıw)
• Bulgarian: заду'шен (zadu'šen), непроветрен (bg) (neprovetren)
• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 焗 (guk⁶)

  Mandarin: 悶 / 闷 (zh) (mèn, mēn)

• Dutch: muf (nl), bedompt (nl), benauwd (nl)
• Finnish: tunkkainen (fi)
• French: mal aéré, étouffant (fr), bouché (fr) (nose)
• German: stickig (de), verstopfte (de) (nose)
• Italian: chiuso (it) (nose)
• Korean: 답답하다 (ko) (dapdaphada)
• Macedonian: за́душен (zádušen), непро́ветрен (nepróvetren), за́душлив (zádušliv)
• Maori: haitutu
• Plautdietsch: enj
• Portuguese: entupido (pt) (nose), estufado (pt)
• Russian: (air) ду́шный (ru) (dúšnyj), спёртый (ru) (spjórtyj); (nose) зало́женный (ru) (zalóžennyj), заби́тый (ru) (zabítyj)
• Spanish: mal ventilado, congestionado (es), taponado (es)
• Walloon: stof (wa) (in verbal expression "fé stof" to get stuffy), stofant n (same use "fé stofant")

stout; mettlesome; resolute

• Finnish: päättäväinen (fi)
• Macedonian: реши́телен (rešítelen)
• Spanish: brioso (es)

angry and obstinate; sulky

• Finnish: murjottava (fi)
• French: fâché (fr), en rogne (fr)
• Macedonian: на́муртен (námurten)

Noun

stuffy (plural stuffies)

1. (US, Canada, colloquial, often childish) Synonym of stuffed toy

Alternative forms

• stuffie

Translations

stuffed toy — see soft toy