Library / English Dictionary

SOFT-PEDAL

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

Irregular inflected forms: soft-pedalled    , soft-pedalling   

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Play down or obscure

Example:

His advisers soft-pedaled the president's blunder

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Hypernyms (to "soft-pedal" is one way to...):

background; downplay; play down (understate the importance or quality of)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Credits