Famous Sayings: #62 — ‘Fall on Deaf Ears’

May 19, 2017

Sometimes it seems like all her warnings will only fall on deaf ears.

“La-la-la-la-la, I can’t hear you!” Photo by Christopher Blizzard via Flickr. The photo was cropped and used under the Creative Commons ShareAlike 2.0 Generic License.

I had this phrase lined up for this week for a while now, and recent events have made this a timely choice.

But first, let’s get into the meaning of this phrase.

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What Does ‘Fall on Deaf Ears’ Mean?

I consulted numerous sources in order to find the origin, but most only offered their own take on the meaning of the phrase.

From the Macmillan Dictionary, I found this:

if something such as a warning, a request, or an attempt to change someone’s attitude falls on deaf ears, it is completely ignored by the person who hears it

The definition is exactly the same for the American British and versions.

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