What is a synonym?

What is a synonym?

Synonyms are words that have the same, or almost the same, meaning.  

Examples of synonyms

Verbs

‘laugh’ and ‘chuckle’ and ‘giggle’

‘injure’ and ‘harm’ and ‘hurt’

Nouns

‘litter’ and ‘rubbish’

‘answer’ and ‘reply’ and ‘response’

‘insanity’ and ‘madness’ and ‘mental illness’

Adjectives

‘foolish’ and ‘silly’

‘little’ and ‘small’

‘happy’ and ‘cheerful’

Prepositions

‘on’ and ‘upon’

‘under’ and ‘below’ and ‘beneath’

Adverbs

‘quickly’ and ‘rapidly’ and ‘fast’

‘slowly’ and ‘gradually’

Very few synonyms have exactly the same meaning; most synonyms have a slightly different meaning or connotation depending on context.

For example, ‘slim’ and ‘thin’ are synonyms, but

“Michael is slim”

could be a more positive statement than

“Michael is thin”

because ‘slim’ can imply healthy and attractive, whereas ‘thin’ might imply unhealthy or unwell.

What is a thesaurus?

A thesaurus is a book that lists words and their synonyms. You can use one to help you increase and improve your English vocabulary. When you look for the meaning of an unfamiliar word in your dictionary, look for synonyms in a thesaurus as well.

I recommend and use the Penguin Reference Roget's Thesaurus , the Oxford School Thesaurus and the Oxford Paperback Dictionary & Thesaurus .

Macmillan Dictionary has a useful free online thesaurus.

 

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