The word 小丑 is formed by combining two pictorial and conceptual ideas: 小 meaning "small" or "insignificant", and 丑 meaning "ugly", "disgraceful", or "clown". Together, they create a compound where "small" modifies "ugliness" not in size, but in social or moral stature, depicting a person whose ridiculous, disgraceful, or foolish behavior makes them a laughable object of contempt, directly mapping to the concept of a "clown" or "buffoon" whose role is to be a petty, humorous spectacle.