English Explanatory Dictionary

description

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. A sketch or account of anything in words; a portraiture or representation in language; an enumeration of the essential qualities of a thing or species.
  2. The act of describing; a delineation by marks or signs.
  3. A set of characteristics by which someone or something can be recognized.
  4. A scientific documentation of a taxon for the purpose of introducing it to science.
  5. The act or practice of recording and describing actual language usage in a given speech community, as opposed to prescription, i.e. laying down norms of language usage.
  6. A descriptive linguistic survey.

Pronunciation

/dɪˈskɹɪpʃən/ /dəˈskɹɪpʃən/ en-us-description.ogg

Word forms

description descriptions

Etymology

From Middle English descripcioun, from Old French description and its etymon, Latin dēscrīptiō, noun of action of dēscrībō (“to describe”). Equivalent to describe + -tion.

Synonyms

sort kind type variety

Related words

describe descriptive prescription descriptivism synopsis interpretation

Derived words

audiodescription audio description beggar description charge description master descriptional descriptionally descriptionism descriptionist descriptionistic description language descriptionless description logic description word hardware description language ideographic description sequence job description metadescription misdescription nondescription nondescriptional of any description of some description overdescription redescription videodescription video description
This entry uses open data from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA/GFDL). Word forms are used for search and are not indexed as separate pages.
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