Definition of Uncanny

uncanny (adjective) - not canny; unsafe; strange; weird; ghostly

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How can uncanny be used in a sentence?

  1. I want to know just what kind of uncanny guides await us.

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  2. He added that Ramaphosa's instincts had been "uncanny" because

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  3. It's called the uncanny valley and it goes back as far as Freud.

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  4. The men -- some of them -- say she's got a kind of uncanny fascination.

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  5. There is, however, something very "uncanny" to the Saxon eye about Farmhill.

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  6. Things looked "uncanny;" but time did not pause, and the story was forgotten.

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  7. For it must be remembered we were living in what Moncrieff called uncanny times.

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  8. They all seemed to move with a kind of uncanny grace that I almost never Saw in humalls.

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  9. But his sensitivity seemed to give him a kind of uncanny clairvoyance, and he was a mesmerizing writer.

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  10. And we were able to cross this line, called the uncanny valley, in terms of -- artificial intelligence terms.

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  11. I remembered his threat, and felt sure that all the long years of rivalry were about to culminate in uncanny battle.

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  12. LARSON: But what was really kind of uncanny about the whole thing was that Daniel Burnham was sailing -- sailing toward Europe.

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  13. In magic lantern shows of the 1790s, the uncanny is realised: "dark rooms, where spectres from the dead they rise" (Castle 141).

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  14. In fact, in so far as the uncanny is also a signifier to which a real world referent can be attached we might be even more dubious.

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  15. In the old days, that had been of no great moment; it was understood that an occasional fisher girl or boy would have an "uncanny" spouse.

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  16. In our lit-crit terminology, this unsettling aspect of the "uncanny" is the implicity of a boulomaic modality of "should not have happened".

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  17. I think I can best deal with the first of those questions by telling you of certain uncanny apprehensions which were conveyed to me in Warsaw.

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  18. So the uncanny could be the result of a sudden and unexpected wrong turn in the normal process of perception and learning, by people or monkeys.

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  19. So, where the authority of the uncanny is validated in Horror we have a pessimistic view in which, ultimately, the world itself is against the hero.

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  20. And so, where the authority of the uncanny is negated in Heroic Fantasy we have an optimistic view in which, ultimately, the world itself is on the hero's side.

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  21. And Roboticist Masahiro Mori used the term uncanny valley to describe the disconcerting reaction people had to robots as they became more human-like in their appearance.

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  22. Female bodies, violence, sexuality, death and a play with the uncanny are the running themes, all with a politically subversive subtext written into the surrealist dreamscape.

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  23. Old possessions were always kind of uncanny and uncomfortable to her temperament; they held too poignant a suggestion of death, of the passing of time and of almost forgotten memories.

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  24. "She probably knows some other way of leaving," thought Sally, recalling the uncanny knowledge of the campus secrets that had been responsible for the entrance of the eccentric Madam Z--.

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  25. There was something 'uncanny' and goblin-like in her appearance, and yet her sallow face had a certain charm when the smile illumined it, and the light of aspiration burned up in the large wild eyes.

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  26. Belgian and U.S. investigators had been informed of the "uncanny" resemblance of cases in Belgium and South Africa in which abducted girls are known or believed to have been held captive by paedophiles.

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  27. I did not know the story of "St. Christopher the Dog-Head" or Ratramnus 'reply to Rimbert when I wrote the original "Eifelheim," lo these many years ago; but there is a certain uncanny similarity in the stories.

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  28. I've been thinking about the whole notion of the fantastic marvellous and the fantastic uncanny, which is Todorov's big conceptual contribution to the study of the strange part of strange fiction (as I understand it, that is).

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  29. Unconsciously I followed that parade a whole dozen blocks myself, and when I finally came out of the trance, or whatever it was, and started back to the hotel, the entire atmosphere seemed filled with some kind of uncanny dope.

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  30. He's trying to see things with your eyes, feeling them with your nerves, and since he's got a kind of uncanny penetration, I'd be willing to bet that he can tell you, half the time, what you're thinking about better than you could yourself.

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  31. If the illusion holds in "Rise of the Planet of the Apes," he said, it is because of several small but significant engineering steps that can take audiences past what is called the "uncanny valley," the spot at which an animation loses credibility.

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  32. Over the space of the first hour, the film zoomed into the skyscraper, the image darkening until all that could be seen were the lights of the high-rise; and in uncanny synchronicity, this was also all we could see of the Cologne skyline to the west.

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  33. And in so far as the uncanny is a signifier to which a real world referent can be attached -- the bestial amorality at the heart of human nature, the id unbound -- we might be equally dubious of the acts of validation carried out in the revelations of Horror.

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  34. All that he saw of foreign lands was at the Exhibition of 1851, where he frequently accosted foreigners in their own tongue, so that it began to be whispered about that he was "uncanny": he excited so much remark that his daughter thought it better to drag him away.

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  35. In a trio Aennchen recalls the uncanny nature of the spot, Agathe warns against the sin of tempting Providence and begs him to stay; but Max protests his fearlessness and the call of duty, and hurries away to meet Caspar, at the appointed time in the appointed place.

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  36. We may quite allowably heighten the above picture by supposing that the person in her trance, in addition to being mad, might have displayed some of the perceptive powers occasionally developed in trance; and so have evinced, in addition to her demoniacal ferocity, an "uncanny" knowledge of things and persons.

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  37. And an excerpt from the Faren Miller review says: The situation seems less grim than exciting to a pair of girls who barely manage to hide their lesbianism, their anti-government sentiments, and certain uncanny capabilities (for whatever the leaders wish to think, whatever the laws decree, magic does exist here).

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  38. The prison camps in Germany were not without Allied dispatch-riders who had become "rattled" and had blundered into the enemy's arms, but Thatchy had a kind of uncanny extra sense, a bump of locality, if you will, and that is why they had sent him into this geographical tangle where maps became out of date as fast as they were made.

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  39. This interest in common things was gratifying to Aunt Charlotte, who distrusted and discouraged his dwelling on what she called the uncanny side of life; but she was anxious, at the same time, that he should not overtax his strength, and gave secret orders to Lubin to see that the young master did not allow his ardour to outrun the dictates of discretion.

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  40. In fact, part of the reason I replaced Todorov's term uncanny with creepy in my own model, is that I think talk of the uncanny often carries a sense of angst felt in the face of the truly unknown -- i.e. when we are faced with a strange-and-creepy event so alien we are not even able to decide whether it fits our nomology or not, whether it is artifice or anomaly.

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  41. The men who deal with manuscripts -- editors, publishers 'readers, and publishers, men not only expert witnesses in regard to the printed literature of the day, but also curiously learned in the story of the book unborn, the vast mass of writing that never arrives at print -- are even more impressed by what one might call the uncanny literary brilliance of the time.

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Tips for Using uncanny in a Sentence

You may have an easier time writing sentences with uncanny if you know what words are likely to come before or after it, or simply what words are often found in the same sentence.

Frequent Predecessors

Words that often come before uncanny in sentences. For example: "an uncanny" or "the uncanny"

  • an
  • the
  • almost
  • and
  • with
  • his
  • was
  • something
  • of
  • is

Frequent Successors

Words that often come after uncanny in sentences. For example: "uncanny ." or "uncanny ability"

  • .
  • ability
  • resemblance
  • and
  • in
  • knack
  • sense
  • way
  • feeling
  • accuracy

Associated Words

Words that aren't necessarily predecessors or successors, but are often found in the same sentence.

  • knack
  • resemblance
  • quasar
  • excalibur
  • wolverine
  • cyclops
  • magneto
  • mystique
  • mutant
  • daredevil

Alternate Definitions

    A sentence using uncanny