stigma

plural stigmata · plural stigmas · alternative stigmat · alternative stigmate · alternative stigme

1. An indication of infamy or disgrace.

   But to have as an enforced dining companion a man who was probably a Papist, certainly a rake, and bore the stigma of cowardice, was anathema.

   2023 September 8, David Donachie, A Shred of Honour: A Markham of the Marines Novel, Rowman & Littlefield, →ISBN, page 2

   1. historicalA permanent identity mark branded, cut or tattooed onto the skin, typically given to slaves, criminals and traitors.
   2. figurativelyA negative and often unfair attitude (held by a group or society, to something).First known use 1980s?–

      ... the stigma in the United States about the lower class accessing “welfare,” […]

      2024 December 15, Amy Speier, Mobility in North American Surrogacy: A Fertile Global Industry, Bloomsbury Publishing PLC, →ISBN, page 67

      4 more examples

      Yet, because of the stigma around nursing home placement, it is hard to find advocates from among the natural advocacy groups the families. You don't see families organized around long-term care as you do around specific diseases.

      1982, Journal of Gerontological Nursing

      Hence, the stigma attached to mental disorders in general forms the basis of the stigma towards women with mental health problems. […]

      2010 March 18, Dora Kohen, Oxford Textbook of Women and Mental Health, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 5

      While in the past 100 years women attained suffrage, segregation was ended, and civil rights were established that protected minorities, the century-old stigma toward Oniontown has remained remarkably intact.

      2012 January 23, Aaron Lake Smith, “Peeling Oniontown”, in VICE, archived from the original on 02 May 2025

      Coming into contact with the person affected by mental illness can help reduce the stigma that the public has towards the illness.

      2018 March 8, Darko Pozder, Without Stigma: About the Stigma of the Mental Illness, Xlibris Corporation, →ISBN

   3. chiefly in the plural stigmataChristianityA mark on the body corresponding to one of the wounds of the Crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and sometimes reported to bleed periodically.
   4. figurativelypoeticrareAn expression or behaviour revealing one's hidden feelings.

      Bradly scowled - the stigmata of alarm. What ultimate threat to his peace and privacy did this dropping in by young Podson imply?

      1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, →OCLC, page 65

2. A scar or birthmark.
3. biologyThe sticky part of a flower that receives pollen during pollination.

   Now you see just how the stamen gets its lusty dust onto the stigma / And why this frenzied chlorophyllous orgy starts in spring is no enigma!

   1982, Dennis Linde, “Reproduction”, in Grease 2

   1 more example

   Black crowberry. Empetrum nigrum. Crowberry Family. Fruit. — The black drupe is berrylike, globular, and incloses six to nine seedlike nutlets with a seed in each. The calyx is at the base and the stigma is at the apex. The drupes are solitary in the leaf axils. They are juicy, acid, edible, and serve as food for the Arctic birds.

   1905, Maude Gridley Peterson, How to Know Wild Fruits: A Guide to Plants When Not in Flower by Means of Fruit and Leaf, Macmillan, page 202

   Synonyms: summit

4. medicineA visible sign or characteristic of a disease.
5. biologySynonym of pterostigma.

   Synonyms: pterostigma

plural stigmas

1. mediaA ligature of the Greek letters sigma and tau: Ϛ / ϛ.