Sample Sentences for
repress
grouped by contextual meaning
(editor-reviewed)

repress as in:  she repressed a laugh

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She tried to repress her laughter while they talked, but a smile kept breaking through.
repress = hold back (not allow it to be expressed)
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    She had learned to repress her anger in front of her parents, keeping his face calm even when he was furious inside.
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    ...laughing ... They tried at first to repress it, but Aslan said:  (source)
    repress = hold back (not express)
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    Elizabeth could not repress a smile at this, but she answered only by a slight inclination of the head.  (source)
    repress = keep from being expressed
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    The child had evidently been crying and Marilla felt a pang of pity which she sternly repressed.  (source)
    repressed = kept from developing or being expressed
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    Though the Count was not a man to gloat, he could not repress a smile of satisfaction.†  (source)
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    But it's well known that repression makes a religion flourish.†  (source)
    standard suffix: The suffix "-sion", converts a verb into a noun that denotes the action or result of the verb. Typically, there is a slight change in the ending of the root verb, as in admission from admit, discussion from discuss, and invasion from invade.
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    There's no way I'm functioning as normally as I am without repressing something.†  (source)
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    Repressive societies always seemed to understand the danger of "wrong" ideas.†  (source)
    standard suffix: The suffix "-ive" converts a word into an adjective; though over time, what was originally an adjective often comes to be used as a noun. The adjective pattern means tending to and is seen in words like attractive, impressive, and supportive. Examples of the noun include narrative, alternative, and detective.
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    By disparagement, by starvation, by repressions, forced direction, and the stunning hammerblows of conditioning, the free, roving mind is being pursued, roped, blunted, drugged.†  (source)
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    The train fills him with foreboding, but he represses the fear and walks up and down, peering inside.†  (source)
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    And thrice repress'd his rage; strong gales supplied, And push'd the vessel o'er the swelling tide.†  (source)
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    'I'm dealin' with it, all righ'?' said Hagrid repressively.†  (source)
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    He'd fallen against the stone wall opposite and let out a snarl of unrepressed anger.†  (source)
    standard prefix: The prefix "un-" in unrepressed means not and reverses the meaning of repressed. This is the same pattern you see in words like unhappy, unknown, and unlucky.
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repress as in:  repressed the rebellion

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    The witch-hunt was not, however, a mere repression.  (source)
    repression = use of force to suppress unpopular ideas or people
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    Mama Elena threw her a look that seemed to Tita to contain all the years of repression that had flowed over the family, and said: “If he intends to ask for your hand, tell him not to bother. He'll be wasting his time and mine too. You know perfectly well that being the youngest daughter means you have to take care of me until the day I die.”  (source)
    repression = subjugation (oppression that held her back)
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    This day-to-day falsification of the past, carried out by the Ministry of Truth, is as necessary to the stability of the regime as the work of repression and espionage carried out by the Ministry of Love.  (source)
    repression = using force to control people or ideas
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    The land fell into fewer hands, the number of the dispossessed increased, and every effort of the great owners was directed at repression.  (source)
    repression = subjugation (oppressing or holding others down)
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    It is still impossible for man to organize his social life without repressions, and the balance has yet to be struck between order and freedom.  (source)
    repressions = uses of force to suppress unpopular ideas
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    Evidently the time came in New England when the repressions of order were heavier than seemed warranted by the dangers against which the order was organized.  (source)
    repressions = uses of force to suppress unpopular ideas or people
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repress as in:  repressed the memory

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Psychologists believe that people sometimes repress traumatic childhood memories as a way to protect themselves from emotional pain.
repress = suppress from conscious awareness
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    For years, she repressed her fear of abandonment, never realizing how much it was affecting her relationships.
    repressed = suppressed from conscious awareness
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    Frequently there is a particular experience which the person is desperately trying to repress.  (source)
    repress = suppress from conscious awareness
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    It's got to be written now before John and I mature and repress the whole thing.  (source)
    repress = put out of our conscious memory (the memory of which we are aware)
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Freud believed that the dream was a "disguised fulfillment of a repressed wish."  (source)
repressed = suppress from conscious awareness
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