To blame someone means to say they're responsible for something that went wrong. When you blame your brother for breaking the lamp, you're saying it's his fault. When a coach blames the loss on poor practice attendance, she's pointing to what she thinks caused the problem.

Blame often comes with a negative feeling attached to it. It's different from simply explaining what happened. If you say “The window broke when the ball hit it,” you're describing cause and effect. But if you say “You broke the window!” in an angry voice, you're assigning blame, which adds judgment and often implies the person should have known better or tried harder.

People sometimes look for someone to blame when things go wrong, even when the situation is complicated or nobody's really at fault. If your team loses a close game, blaming the referee or one player rarely helps anyone improve.

The word can also be used to show understanding: “I don't blame you for being upset” means “Your reaction makes sense given what happened.” Sometimes people say “Don't blame me!” when they want to make clear they weren't involved in whatever went wrong.

As a noun, blame is the responsibility or fault for something bad: “He took the blame for the mistake” or “The blame fell on the wrong person.”