as in deformation
the twisting of something out of its natural or normal shape or condition
the comedian is renowned for his seemingly endless variety of facial contortions
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Recent Examples of contortion
The oil made her body slippery, allowing rescuers to pull her out of the passageway by working in reverse and undoing all the contortions that trapped her.
—
Mark Gray, PEOPLE, 25 Oct. 2025
The incidents highlight the contortions of the Taliban four years after seizing power of Afghanistan.
—NPR, 14 Oct. 2025
DiCaprio actually is quite funny early on in the film, but his performance loses steam in the back half, as his broad gestures and facial contortions can’t quite match the grim subtlety of Scorsese’s direction of the later scenes.
—Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 2 Oct. 2025
Mark Gray, PEOPLE, 25 Oct. 2025
The incidents highlight the contortions of the Taliban four years after seizing power of Afghanistan.
—NPR, 14 Oct. 2025
DiCaprio actually is quite funny early on in the film, but his performance loses steam in the back half, as his broad gestures and facial contortions can’t quite match the grim subtlety of Scorsese’s direction of the later scenes.
—Bilge Ebiri, Vulture, 2 Oct. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for contortion
Noun
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Asurvey of three species of octopuses from Europe and the Americas catalogued a total of 6,781 arm deformations.—
Rafil Kroll-Zaidi,
Harpers Magazine,
29 Oct. 2025
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Their anisotropic molecular structure allows precise shape changes and, in the case of CLCEs, structural color changes under mechanical deformation.—
Jijo Malayil,
Interesting Engineering,
26 Oct. 2025
Noun
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Personal remembrance becomes interwoven with political fiction, historical fact, and mythological distortion in the flood of stories that customarily follows a war.—
Elizabeth D. Samet,
Foreign Affairs,
29 Oct. 2025
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The last quarter of the eighteenth century was a pre-democratic era, and all efforts to read a Jacksonian or Tocquevillian faith in the wisdom of the common man into the American founding are misleading distortions.—
Literary Hub,
Literary Hub,
28 Oct. 2025
Noun
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The disease can also cause foot deformities that worsen over time.—
Diana Leyva,
Nashville Tennessean,
24 Oct. 2025
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From a practical standpoint, however, pointy-toed shoes can lead to foot deformities and health problems.—
Michael Watson,
The Conversation,
20 Oct. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Contortion.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/contortion. Accessed 31 Oct. 2025.
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