phrase
A short written or spoken expression.
Example
“I've made progress, but this is still, in Churchill's phrase, just "the end of the beginning."”
Other meanings
A word or, more commonly, a group of words that functions as a single unit in the syntax of a sentence, always containing an expressed or implied head (the principal word or subgroup, with core importance) and often consisting of a head plus some other elaborating words.
A small section of music in a larger piece.
Related words
- tortured phrase
- adjective phrase
- catch-all phrase
- adpositional phrase
- adverbial phrase
- adverb phrase
- antecedent phrase
- bombard phrase
- recovery phrase
- consequent phrase
- determiner phrase
- empty phrase
Word history
From Ancient Greek "φράσις" (manner of expression).
Where this comes from
This definition is adapted from “phrase” on Wiktionary, by its contributors, published under CC BY-SA 4.0. This page is published under the same licence.