American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A sequence of words intended to have meaning.
- n. A characteristic way or mode of expression.
- n. A brief, apt, and cogent expression.
- n. A word or group of words read or spoken as a unit and separated by pauses or other junctures.
- n. Grammar Two or more words in sequence that form a syntactic unit that is less than a complete sentence.
- n. Music A short passage or segment, often consisting of four measures or forming part of a larger unit.
- n. A series of dance movements forming a unit in a choreographic pattern.
- v. To express orally or in writing: The speaker phrased several opinions.
- v. To pace or mark off (something read aloud or spoken) by pauses.
- v. Music To divide (a passage) into phrases.
- v. Music To combine (notes) in a phrase.
- v. To make or render phrases, as in reading aloud.
- v. Music To perform a passage with the correct phrasing.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A brief expression; more specifically, two or more words expressing what is practically a single notion, and thus performing the office of a single part of speech, or entering with a certain degree of unity into the structure of a sentence.
- n. A peculiar or characteristic expression; a mode of expression peculiar to a language; an idiom.
- n. The manner or style in which a person ex presses himself; diction; phraseology; language; also, an expression, or a form of expression.
- n. In music, a short and somewhat independent division or part of a piece, less complete than a period, and usually closing with a cadence or a half-cadence. A phrase usually includes four or eight measures. The name is also given less technically to any short passage or figure that is performed without pause or break.
- n. In fencing, a period between the beginning and end of a short passage at arms between fencers during which there is no pause, each fencer thrusting and parrying in turn
- n. See the adjectives.
- n. Synonyms See term.
- To employ peculiar phrases or forms of speech; ex press one's self.
- In music, to divide a piece in performance into short sections or phrases, so as to bring out the metrical and harmonic form of whole, and make it musically intelligible; also, to perform any group of tones without pause.
- To express or designate by a particular phrase or term; call; style.
- n. A short written or spoken expression.
- n. grammar A word or group of words that functions as a single unit in the syntax of a sentence, usually consisting of a head, or central word, and elaborating words.
- n. music A small section of music in a larger piece.
- v. intransitive (music) To perform a passage with the correct phrasing.
- v. transitive To express (an action, thought or idea) by means of words.
- v. transitive (music) To divide into melodic phrases.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A brief expression, sometimes a single word, but usually two or more words forming an expression by themselves, or being a portion of a sentence.
- n. A short, pithy expression; especially, one which is often employed; a peculiar or idiomatic turn of speech.
- n. A mode or form of speech; the manner or style in which any one expreses himself; diction; expression.
- n. (Mus.) A short clause or portion of a period.
- v. To express in words, or in peculiar words; to call; to style.
- v. rare To use proper or fine phrases.
- v. (Mus.) To group notes into phrases. See Phrase, n., 4.
- n. dance movements that are linked in a single choreographic sequence
- n. an expression consisting of one or more words forming a grammatical constituent of a sentence
- n. an expression whose meanings cannot be inferred from the meanings of the words that make it up
- v. put into words or an expression
- v. divide, combine, or mark into phrases
- n. a short musical passage
- From Late Latin phrasis ("diction"), from Ancient Greek φράσις (phrasis, "manner of expression"), from φράζω (phrazō, "I tell, express"). (Wiktionary)
- Latin phrasis, diction, from Greek, speech, diction, phrase, from phrazein, to point out, show; see gwhren- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
“-- _Compose sentences in which each of these three participles shall be used as an adjective modifier, as the principal word in a prepositional phrase, as the principal word in a phrase used as a subject or as an object complement, as a mere adjective, as a mere noun, and in an absolute phrase_: --”
“The +infinitive phrase+ may be used +after a preposition+ as the +principal term+ of another phrase.”
“The process of extension or expansion, by means of which the phrase usually assumes a somewhat irregular length, consists mainly in the varied repetition of the figures or motives that it contains; and the continuity of the whole, as extension of the _one phrase_, is maintained by suppressing the cadence -- suspending all cadential interruption -- during the lengthening process.”
“-- A third method consists in expanding the period into a double-period (precisely as the phrase was lengthened into a double-phrase, or period), _by avoiding a perfect cadence at the end of the second phrase_, and adding another pair of phrases to balance the first pair.”
“cadence-measure of the old phrase" is unquestionably _at the same time the first measure, or actual beginning, of the new phrase_.”
“II. iv.155 (385,1) Do you but mark how this becomes the house?] [T: the use?] [Warburton called "becomes the house" "a most expressive phrase"] with this _most expressive phrase_ I believe no reader is satisfied.”
“My informal count in "Hot, Flat, and Crowded" shows that Mr. Friedman used the title phrase or some variation of it nearly 40 times: an average of one appearance every 12 pages.”
“Some are so shocking that the title phrase is uttered aloud.”
“In China, the phrase is code for attempting to deal with income inequalities, especially the hardships of farmers and millions of migrant laborers.”
“Pretty sure that phrase translates as well as the word ‘fag’, so you should know that ‘man bangs’ refers to the ridiculous floppy hairstyle previously sported by Chace and his identical eyebrow twin, Zac Efron.”
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