malaise

plural malaises

1. countableuncountableA feeling of general bodily discomfort, fatigue or unpleasantness, often at the onset of illness.

   Volkswagen’s travails are symbolic of the nation’s overall economic malaise and a political crisis that collapsed the government in December, paving the way for early elections Feb. 23.

   2025 January 27, Lenora Chu, “How Volkswagen slid from German engineering icon to innovation laggard”, in The Christian Science Monitor

   2 more examples

   Addressing tech malaise has become a trend with authors and self-help coaches – such as Catherine Price, author of How to Break Up With Your Phone, who, during a $295, 50-minute phone call, will offer you advice on things like how to create roadblocks to checking your phone by putting a rubber band around your screen, and “think of the bigger picture” rather than what you’re missing on Twitter.

   2019 August 21, Adrienne Matei, “Shock! Horror! Do you know how much time you spend on your phone?”, in The Guardian

   The Euston Rush hit the headlines last year. It also became synonymous with a lack of respect for passengers, a disregard for planning in stations, and a general malaise in the rail industry.

   2025 November 12, Tom Edwards, “Tackling the 'Euston Rush'”, in RAIL, number 1048, page 32

   Synonyms: unease, doldrums, ill at ease

2. countableuncountableAn ambiguous feeling of mental or moral depression.

   1 more example

   Their failure helped produce the widespread malaise reported by Thucydides: the Athenians "grieved over their private sufferings, the common people because, having started out with less, they were deprived even of that; the rich had lost their beautiful estates in the country, the houses as well as their expensive furnishings, but worst of all, they had war instead of peace" (2.65.2).

   2003, Donald Kagan, The Peloponnesian War

   Synonyms: melancholy, weltschmerz, angst

3. countableuncountableIll will or hurtful feelings for others or someone.