disservice

English

Etymology

From dis- +‎ service.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /dɪ(s)ˈsɜːvɪs/
• enPR: dis·sər´vĭs, IPA^(key): /dɪ(s)ˈsɝvɪs/

Noun

disservice (countable and uncountable, plural disservices)

1. Service that results in harm; an (intentionally or unintentionally) unhelpful, harmful action.
   • 2014, Michele Kaschub, Janice Smith, Promising Practices in 21st Century Music Teacher Education, Oxford University Press (→ISBN)

     Often schools of music focus solely on the canon of Western classical art music, but this is a disservice to music educators who will have to deal with students from many different backgrounds and preferences.

   • 2018 July 5, Sam Greer, “Games want to offer us many roads but Kentucky Route Zero is the one road that matters”, in Eurogamer‎^[1]:

     Treating narratives like something you can stretch out to give more value does a disservice to players and our engagement.

   One renders young persons a disservice by heaping unearned rewards on them.

Translations

service that results in harm

• Armenian: ^{(please verify)} արջի ծառայություն (arǰi caṙayutʻyun)
• Belarusian: мядзве́джая паслу́га f (mjadzvjédžaja paslúha) (bear's service)
• Bulgarian: ^{(please verify)} лоша услуга f (loša usluga)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: ^{(please verify)} 幫倒忙／帮倒忙 (bāng dào máng), ^{(please verify)} 帮倒忙 (zh) (bāngdàománg)

• Czech: medvědí služba (cs) f (bear's service)
• Finnish: karhunpalvelus (fi) (bear's service)
• French: mauvais service m, desservice (fr) m
• German: Bärendienst (de) m (bear's service), schlechter Dienst m, Schaden (de) m
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Japanese: ^{(please verify)} ひどい仕打ち (ひどいしうち, hidoi shiuchi)
• Lithuanian: meškos paslauga f (bear's service)
• Polish: niedźwiedzia przysługa (pl) f (bear's service)
• Portuguese: desserviço m
• Russian: медве́жья услу́га (ru) f (medvéžʹja uslúga) (bear's service)
• Spanish: flaco favor
• Swedish: björntjänst (sv) c (bear's service)
• Ukrainian: ведме́жа по́слуга f (vedméža pósluha) (bear's service)

Verb

disservice (third-person singular simple present disservic, present participle es, simple past and past participle disserviced)

1. To disserve, to provide a disservice to; to provide harmful or inadequate service to.
   • 1975, Sarah Katharine Thomson, Learning resource centers in community colleges:

     One librarian said, "I could double the circulation tomorrow by closing the periodical stacks and counting every time I handed out a magazine, but I would be disservicing our readers."

Translations

disserve — see disserve

Related terms

• disserve

References

• “disservice”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “disservice”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.