- insubordinate
- insubordinate, rebellious, mutinous, seditious, factious, contumacious mean having or showing defiance or indifference to constituted authority.Insubordinate is used primarily in reference to a person whose status is that of a subordinate and especially of a member of an organized group (as a force, a crew, or a staff) under the control of a head (as a military or naval officer, a chief, or a master) who is responsible for their service as individuals and their discipline as a group; the term implies disobedience to orders or infraction of rules either as a particular instance or as a habit{
insubordinate sailors are confined in the warship's brig
}{insubordination . . . may consist simply in a persistent and concerted refusal or omission to obey orders, or to do duty, with an insubordinate intent—Manual for Courts-Martial
}Rebellious implies disaffection and insubordination; it may refer to a state of mind or to a temperamental tendency{temperamentally rebellious, instinctively disliking externally imposed authority— Biddle
}but more often it suggests active or organized resistance{rebellious troops
}{an outlaw'd desperate man, the chief of a rebellious clan— Scott
}{the sword his grandsire bore in the rebellious days of yore— Longfellow
}Mutinous is a stronger and more derogatory term than rebellious which may imply justifiable resistance, for it suggests the refusal to obey the lawful demands or commands of an officer in charge, especially a military, naval, or ship's officer, with the result that there is no longer discipline and efficiency in the group or, if the mutiny is successful, that a new and usually unlawful control is set up{the master ordered the mutinous sailors put into irons
}{the mutinous members of the crew finally gained the upper hand
}{each one . . . gave him to understand, roughly and roundly, that to go to sea in her they would not. In the midst of this mutinous uproar, the alarmed consul stood fast— Melville
}Mutinous is also frequently applied to active forces (as passions, winds, or waters) that are exceedingly turbulent or uncontrollable{I have . . . called forth the mutinous winds— Shak.
}{mutinous passions, and conflicting fears— Shelley
}Seditious implies treasonable activities and often specifically a stirring up of discontent or of opposition to or rebellion against the gov-ernment{seditious societies
}{seditious writings
}{seditious factionalism went on a rampage and began to wreck our foreign policy— Ascoli
}{Revolutions that were not made in Boston, by Boston gentlemen, were quite certain to be wicked and seditious— Parrington
}Factious stresses the contentious, perverse, or turbulent provocation of party spirit or a tendency to break up into embittered and irreconcilable factions. Only when it implies as a result the destruction of peace in the group as a whole does it suggest indifference to or defiance of constituted authority; very frequently it suggests the opposition of legislative groups or blocs to the government{a quarrelsome, factious race
}{the government's plan to entertain the proposals for peace aroused the factious spirit of the parliament
}{Florence . . . sowing the wind and reaping the whirlwind, wearing her soul out by factious struggles— Oliphant
}{the Opposition will be vigilant but not factious. We shall not oppose merely for the sake of opposition— Attlee
}Contumacious is found chiefly in legal and ecclesiastical use. It implies persistent, willful, or open disobedience of the orders of a court or of one's superiors; often, it specifically suggests contempt of court by a bold refusal to obey a summons or subpoena, or open and stubborn defiance of laws or orders that are seldom disobeyed{on her refusal to appear in person or by her attorney, she was pronounced contumacious— Lingard
}{magistrates and populace were incensed at a refusal of customary marks of courtesy and respect for the laws, which in their eyes was purely contumacious— Inge
}Analogous words: recalcitrant, refractory, *unruly, ungovernable, intractable
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
