de-queer

verb

To hide, diminish, or reject queerness.

Opposite
re-queer
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Meanings

verbde-queer (third-person singular simple present de-queers, present participle de-queering, simple past and past participle de-queered)

present singular third person de-queers · participle present de-queering · participle past de-queered · past de-queered · alternative dequeer

  1. To hide, diminish, or reject queerness.

    In edition after edition, the Kamasutra has been deliberately dequeered.

    2007, James McConnachie, The Book of Love: In Search of the Kamasutra, page 209
    2 more examples

    The queer movement is dequeered and presented as if it were entirely white, middle-class, and family-oriented.

    2004, Marvin Mahan Ellison, Same-Sex Marriage?: A Christian Ethical Analysis, page 113

    Joan Acocella's polemic against this body of scholarship has had the effect of de-queering Cather for a general readership.

    2007, Heather Love, Feeling Backward: Loss and the Politics of Queer History, page 74

    Antonyms: re-queer

Synonyms & antonyms

verbTo hide, diminish, or reject queerness.

Opposite
re-queer

Origin

From de- + queer.

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

de-queer. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/de-queer

MLA

“de-queer.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/de-queer. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “de-queer,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/de-queer.

Source: de-queer on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.