DictionaryvulgarCrude or offensive
adjective

vulgar

VUL-gur/ˈvʌlɡər/

Lacking refinement or good taste.

The guest's vulgar belching draws disapproving looks at the formal dinner.

A crude guest belches loudly at a formal dinner while other guests react with distaste, no obscene text.
Etymology

The pieces mean “pertaining to the common people.” The modern sense of crudeness probably developed from applying the word to ordinary social classes, turning a social description into a judgment of manners or taste.

In context

Free Audiobook0:41
and were seated in the drawing room among the forbidding black jackabian furniture. We will make a certain allowance for bride nerves, but do not ever be so unmadenly, so vulgar as to subject us to another similar outburst.
Sins of Lady Dacey Audiobook by M. C. Beaton

More examples

  • She disliked his vulgar jokes.
  • The display seemed vulgar rather than elegant.
  • He apologized for the vulgar remark.

Forms

vulgar

Similar words

coarse
Emphasizes roughness or lack of refinement.
crude
Crude emphasizes lack of refinement as well as offensiveness.