I've looked up the word clumsy in oxford dictionary. It says:
(of people and animals) moving or doing things in a very awkward way.
Afterwards, I've looked up the word awkward and seen an example:
He tried to dance, but he was too clumsy and awkward.
At first I thought clumsy and awkward were synonyms, but now I'm quite confused when seeing they stand together. Is it unnecessary to use both of them at the same time? What is the difference between them? Thank you!
Best Answer
If clumsy is used to describe a person, it usually means that that person lacks physical coordination: they trip and fall over a lot, or are always dropping things, or something similar.
However, clumsy can also be used somewhat metaphorically to mean "disjointed" or "haphazard" or even, as dictionary.com puts it, "ill-contrived." Example:
Awkward, when used to describe a situation, can be pretty similar to the metaphorical use of clumsy, or it can be used to mean that something about the situation was socially weird: like if you're trying to make a good impression with your significant other's parents and you make some offhand comment about "oh I hate pie, I prefer cake," but then you find out that one of your SO's parents owns a bakery where they only make pies.
When awkward is used to describe a person, it usually means they are socially awkward: maybe they ask questions that are a little too personal when first meeting someone, or they have a habit of standing too close to people, or whatever.
Mostly, I would say using "clumsy" and "awkward" in the same sentence would be overkill and possibly redundant, but maybe not necessarily. In your example sentence
I would say that clumsy describes the physical lack of coordination that prevented his dancing from being good, and awkward describes the unpleasant atmosphere that resulted from having to watch his awful dancing.