deadpan means deliberately impassive or expressionless. It carries an Arena rating of 1812, earned across 58 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, deadpan ranks #348 of 17,126 for Most Elegant Words, #384 of 17,127 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #1,479 of 17,134 for Most Malleable Words, #2,381 of 17,143 for Best Fossil-Poetry Words.
deadpan is pronounced /ˈdɛdpæn/.
Why “deadpan” is a great word
DEADPAN — [Adjective, Adverb, Noun, Verb] Deliberately impassive or expressionless, especially as a style of comedic delivery. From dead (“lifeless, unresponsive”) + pan (slang for “face”). First attested in the 1920s. Unlike “poker-faced,” which serves to conceal genuine thought, or “dry,” a tonal quality of understatement, deadpan is a specific, unflinching performance—a blank face as the stage for an absurd or biting thought. It is Buster Keaton’s unchanging visage as a house collapses around him, the bureaucratic monotone of a clerk delivering absurd regulations, and the child stating an obscene truth with the blank sincerity of a weather report. It is humor stripped of all warmth, a mask that makes the chaos behind it comedically legible.
Etymology
From dead + pan (“face”).
adj
- Deliberately impassive or expressionless.e.g.“a deadpan face or look”
- Having such a face or look.e.g.“The comedian remained deadpan.”
noun
- A style of comedic delivery in which something humorous is said or done while not exhibiting a change in emotion or facial expression.e.g.“MAREK: But really the deadpan is key. You can essentially trick people into laughing at nothing.” — 2007, Meredith Gran, Octopus Pie #71: Deadpan:
verb
- To express (something) in an impassive or expressionless manner.e.g.“Kidd deadpanned it, stared glassily back at Maitland.” — 2022, Liam McIlvanney, The Heretic, page 496:
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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