strident

Etymology

From French strident, from Latin strīdēns, present active participle of strīdō.

adj

1. Loud; shrill, piercing, high-pitched; rough-sounding
   The trumpet sounded strident against the string orchestra.
2. Grating or obnoxious
   The artist chose a strident mixture of colors.
   If Demandt's essay served as a strident example of the German desire for normalcy, a more subtle example was provided by a brief allohistorical depiction of a Nazi victory in World War II written by German historian Michael Salewski in 1999. 23 May 2005, Gavriel D. Rosenfeld, The World Hitler Never Made: Alternate History and the Memory of Nazism, Cambridge University Press, page 182
3. (nonstandard) Vigorous; making strides
   Under David Taylor's stewardship, the SFA has made strident progress. November 6 2003, Stuart Cosgrove, “Taylor slagging Saddam shame.”, in Daily Record, Glasgow, archived from the original on 2012-11-12

noun

1. (linguistics) One of a class of s-like fricatives produced by an airstream directed at the upper teeth.