Meanings
- uncountableExcessive deference.
Fifty years later, she even blamed her mother for overdeference to the doctors when she was ill with polio.
2010, Linda Gordon, Dorothea Lange: A Life Beyond Limits, pages 17–182 more examples
When the question of expulsion was agitated, Lord Finch stepped forward and made attempts to speak in Steele's behalf, but being embarrassed by modesty and overdeference to an assembly in which he had not yet been accustomed to hold forth, he sat down in visible confusion, saying so as to be over hear, "It is strange I can't speak for this man, though I could readily fight for him."
1831, The Law Magazine and Review: A Quarterly Review of Jurisprudence, pages 22–23In such situations, whites often reflect their consciousness of group membership by overdeference which is as embarrassing to Negroes as condescension.
1965, Earl H. Bell, John Sirjamaki, Social Foundations of Human Behavior, page 344
Origin
Cite this entry
overdeference. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/overdeference
“overdeference.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/overdeference. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “overdeference,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/overdeference.
Source: overdeference on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.