mincing

mincing

1. present participle and gerund of mince

mincing (comparative more mincing, superlative most mincing)

1. Affectedly dainty.
   • 1913, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “chapter 2”, in Sons and Lovers, London: Duckworth & Co. […], →OCLC:

     "Is there nothing to eat in the house?" he asked, insolently, as if to a servant. In certain stages of his intoxication he affected the clipped, mincing speech of the towns. Mrs. Morel hated him most in this condition.

mincing (countable and uncountable, plural mincings)

1. The act by which something is minced.
   • 1931, The Journal of Biological Chemistry, volume 90, page 689:

     After three or four mincings with a coarse blade the product was passed two or three times through a fine blade.

2. Affected dainty speech or movement.
   • 1975, R. M. Koster, The Dissertation, page 118:

     My father, León Fuertes, was a fag three years; a roaring faggot; a lisping, smirking fruit; […] He put on all the trappings of inversion: the twittered mouthings, the hyper-feminine moues, the languid mincings.