dwarf

n., pl., dwarfs, or dwarves (dwôrvz).

1. 1. An abnormally small person, often having limbs and features atypically proportioned or formed.
   2. An atypically small animal or plant.
2. A small creature resembling a human, often ugly, appearing in legends and fairy tales.
3. A dwarf star.

v., dwarfed, dwarf·ing, dwarfs.

v.tr.

1. To check the natural growth or development of; stunt: "The oaks were dwarfed from lack of moisture" (John Steinbeck).
2. To cause to appear small by comparison: "Together these two big men dwarfed the tiny Broadway office" (Saul Bellow).

v.intr.
To become stunted or grow smaller.

[Middle English dwerf, from Old English dweorh.]

dwarfish dwarf'ish adj.
dwarfishness dwarf'ish·ness n.

A name given to a pool of mortgage-backed securities, issued by Fannie Mae, with a maturity of 15 years.

Investopedia Says:
Fannie Mae is short for Federal National Mortgage Association.

Dwarf is a general term given to animals, plants, and other things which are significantly smaller than would ordinarily be expected. The term ‘dwarf’ has historically been attributed to people of profoundly short stature, especially those whose bodily proportions are notably different from those of average people. By contrast, the term ‘midget’ has generally been reserved for people of profound short stature whose bodily proportions are consistent with those of average height. Activists of very short stature prefer to call themselves ‘little people’ because of the negative connotations ‘dwarf’ and especially ‘midget’ have accrued, and because, while not all little people fit strict medical definitions of ‘dwarfism’, all little people face the same sorts of social hardships, regardless of the exact cause of their short statures. ‘Little people’ usually refers to people whose height will not exceed 4 feet 10 inches over the course of their lifetimes.

The causes of short stature are very numerous, and not all well understood. In several historically-isolated groups, ‘short’ stature is actually the norm. For example, some peoples indigenous to Africa and the Malay Peninsula rarely grow over five feet tall. (Europeans have tended to lump these peoples together under the single name ‘Pygmy’.) Among ‘average’ sized peoples, short stature can result if children are given inadequate nutrition or inadequate emotional nurturing. Medical researchers believe that the latter kind of phenomenon, known as ‘psychological dwarfism’, occurs when emotional stress in childhood leads to a growth-hormone deficiency and consequent cessation of growth. Major illnesses in childhood, such as kidney failure, can also contribute to stunting. Children whose growth rates appear slower than normal should therefore be examined carefully so that dangerous metabolic diseases can be ruled out.

Medical professionals use the term ‘dwarfism’ to refer to a host of metabolic conditions which result in profound short stature. In the US, about 1 in 10 000 births is of a child with dwarfism, although diagnosis may not occur for several years. The most common form of dwarfism is achondroplasia. The heads and trunks of achondroplastic dwarfs are average, but their limbs are relatively short and thick. Achondroplastic dwarfs are typically healthy and enjoy the same range of intellect as average-sized people. (As adults they may suffer back and limb pain from the hazards of living in a world designed for much larger people.) In a different syndrome, the bodies of hypopituitary dwarfs — while proportioned in the way typical for ‘average’-height people — produce less than the average amount of growth hormone, and so, unless they take regular injections of growth hormone, they will remain small. In contrast to achondroplastic dwarfs, hypopituitary dwarfs often suffer from underlying metabolic health problems. Other conditions, too numerous to mention here, can also result in dwarfism.

Joan Ablon, a medical anthropologist who has studied the lives of little people and their families, has noted that categorizing dwarfism as a disability is inappropriate for at least two reasons. First, ‘although dwarfism is a dramatic, physically distinctive, and immediately identifiable condition, dwarfs are usually not physically disabled or handicapped in the general sense of these terms …’. As one parent of a dwarf child said, ‘Their bodies are just packaged a little differently.’ Short stature is not a disease, nor does short stature necessarily signal an underlying disease state (if we define disease to mean a metabolically dangerous or physically painful condition).

Secondly, as Ablon writes, ‘in our cultural tradition dwarfs belong to the mythic world, not the mundane world of our daily experience or reality. Dwarfs carry with them the historical and cultural baggage of special and even magical status much more than do persons with various other physical differences.’ In centuries past, dwarfs were commonly displayed, held as captive entertainment, and even given as gifts. Still today, adult dwarfs often find themselves the subjects of unwanted attention. Many report encountering strangers who, without permission, insist on picking them up and treating them like children or dolls. For many dwarfs, acting is the only career available to them — employers are reluctant to hire dwarfs, and on the job many suffer harassment — but even then, dwarfs are typically assigned only to play elves or other charmed or ‘cute’ people.

Our culture rewards tall stature and denigrates small stature. (At least for men, income is positively correlated with height, and tall men are more likely than shorter counterparts to be married or elected to office.) For this reason, some parents of short-stature children have sought treatments to increase the ultimate height of their children. (The available treatments do not work well after puberty, and so they are not an option for adults.) These treatments are extremely expensive and are still considered experimental. One involves the cutting and progressive stretching of the bones of the limbs. A more common approach is the regular injection, throughout childhood, of growth hormone supplements. Until 1984, growth hormone supplements were typically derived from cadavers, but the discovery that some recipients thereby developed Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease ended that practice. Since 1985, clinicians have instead employed synthetic growth hormone developed from recombinant DNA technology.

Because injections of growth hormone might make any child grow taller than she or he would otherwise (note that this is not proven), the possibility has arisen that these treatments could be used on any child, regardless of her/his condition. Indeed, some parents of children who are short, but not growth hormone-deficient, have sought these treatments. This raises many ethical issues, touching on the right of parents to take risks on behalf of a child who has a cosmetically-challenging body, distributive justice, the rights of people with atypical anatomies, and so on. These questions about ‘designing’ or ‘engineering’ children have also been raised by the recent discovery, in 1995, of the genetic basis for achondroplasia. Parents are now able to screen fetuses for achondroplasia and selectively abort them. At the same time, given the hardships of raising a child who quickly grows bigger than oneself, some achondroplastic dwarfs have apparently even considered selectively aborting fetuses who, via the genetic screening, are shown not to be achondroplastic.

— Alice Dreger

Bibliography

• Ablon, J. (1988). Living with difference: families with dwarf children. Praeger, New York.
• Berreby, D. (1996) Up with people: dwarves meet identity politics. The New Republic, 214 (18), 14-9

adjective

Extremely small: diminutive, Lilliputian, midget, miniature, minuscule, minute², pygmy, tiny, wee. Informal peewee, pintsize, pintsized, teensy-weensy, teensy, teeny, teeny-weeny, weeny. See big/small/amount.

adj

Definition: miniature, tiny
Antonyms: big, giant, huge, large

n

Definition: very small person
Antonyms: giant

v

Definition: minimize
Antonyms: maximize, oversize

---

dwarfs
[Old English dweorg]

Not all adult persons of smaller than normal stature in Celtic literature are dwarfs. Several of the denizens of fairy land, for example, are portrayed as smaller than most mortals, but they are not dwarfs. Allusions to non-fairy dwarfs are not especially common in the Celtic world, as compared with Norse or Arthurian traditions. The most celebrated is probably the satyr-like fenodyree, a leading figure in the folklore of the Isle of Man. Welsh dwarfs are more unattractive than those of Ireland or Gaelic Scotland. The Welsh word for dwarf, cor, lies at the root of Coraniaid, a plague upon Wales in Cyfranc Lllud a Llefelys. One of Culhwch's tasks is to retrieve the container of Gwyddolwyn the dwarf, which is needed to keep warm the black witch's blood. The shape-shifting Eiddilig Gor is an enchanting dwarf. The Breton korr is easily identifiable in the roguish korrigans of Breton lore. By contrast in Ireland the dwarf harpist in the court of Fionn mac Cumhaill, Cnú Deireóil, has golden hair and sings sweetly. The benign Áeda (1), dwarf of King Fergus mac Léti, accompanies the dwarf bard Eisirt to the realm of Iubdán. Abcán, a poet, and Luchta, a wood-worker, were both dwarfs of the Tuatha Dé Danann. See also GENIUS CUCULLATUS.

The Old Irish for dwarf is abacc; Modern Irish abhac; Scottish Gaelic troich; Manx crivassan, trollag; Welsh cor; Cornish cor; Breton korr. See Vernon J. Harward, The Dwarfs of Arthurian Romance and Celtic Tradition (Leiden, 1958). See also GNOME.

An abnormally undersized animal or plant. See also dwarfism.

• d. bay — daphne mezereum.
• d. cattle — see dwarfism.
• d. Darling pea — swainsona luteola.
• dolichocephalic d. — dwarf with a long, narrow head.
• d. elder — sambucus ebulus.
• d. goat — a dwarf variety of any of the standard goat breeds; the best known is a dwarf of West African breed.
• d. laurel — kalmia angustifolia.
• proportional d. — see proportional dwarf.
• d. tapeworm — see hymenolepis nana.

A plant that, due to inherited characteristics, is shorter and/or slower growing than the normal forms.

Dwarfs are small people, traditionally regarded as possessing magical qualities or powers of divination. This may thus be a highly fortuitous dream symbol. Alternatively, dwarfs can be negative symbols, representing some part of the dreamer's psyche that is stunted or repressed.

---

Dansk (Danish)
n. - dværg, nisse, dværgvækst
v. tr. - hæmme, få til at virke mindre, stille i skyggen
v. intr. - blive stillet i skyggen

idioms:

• dwarf star    dværgstjerne

Nederlands (Dutch)
dwerg, overschaduwen

Français (French)
n. - nain, arbre nain
v. tr. - rapetisser, écraser, (fig) écraser, éclipser
v. intr. - éclipser, rapetisser, (fig) s'écraser, s'éclipser

idioms:

• dwarf star    star nain

Deutsch (German)
n. - Zwerg, Liliputaner, Zwergpflanze/-tier
v. - verkümmern lassen, in den Schatten stellen

idioms:

• dwarf star    Zwergstern

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - νάνος
v. - κάνω (κάποιον) να φαίνεται/ασήμαντος, μειώνω τη σπουδαιότητα, επισκιάζω, μικραίνω, κονταίνω, σταματώ/ανακόπτω την ανάπτυξη, κατσιάζω

idioms:

• dwarf star    νάνος (αστέρας)

Italiano (Italian)
nano

Português (Portuguese)
n. - anão (m)
v. - ananicar

Русский (Russian)
карлик, затмевать

Español (Spanish)
n. - enano, liliputiense, gnomo
v. tr. - parecer más pequeño, prevenir el crecimiento
v. intr. - hacerse pequeño

idioms:

• dwarf star    enana blanca

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - dvärg
v. - hämma i växten, ställa i skuggan

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
矮子, 侏儒, 使矮小, 阻碍...的生长, 使显得矮小, 变矮小, 发育不全, 萎缩

idioms:

• dwarf star    矮星

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 矮子, 侏儒
v. tr. - 使矮小, 阻礙...的生長, 使顯得矮小
v. intr. - 變矮小, 發育不全, 萎縮

idioms:

• dwarf star    矮星

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 난쟁이, 분재, 꼬마
v. tr. - ~의 성장을 억제하다, ~을 축소하다, 위축시키다
v. intr. - 줄다, 위축되다

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 小人, 小さな動物, 萎縮
adj. - 小型の
v. - 成長を妨げる, 小さく見せる, 小さくする, 小さくなる

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) القزم, إنسان أو نبات أو حيوان أصغر من المعتاد (فعل) يجعل شئ يبدو صغيرا, يصغر‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮גמד‬
v. tr. - ‮עיכב צמיחה, גימד‬
v. intr. - ‮התגמד‬

If you are unable to view some languages clearly, click here.

To select your translation preferences click here.

Dwarf Rabbit	red dwarf
dwarf tree	dwarf plants