Idioms

By Judy Vorfeld

Main Entry: id.i.om
Pronunciation: ’i-dE-&m
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle French & Late Latin; Middle French idiome, from Late Latin idioma indi­vid­ual pecu­liar­ity of lan­guage, from Greek idiOmat-, idiOma, from idi­ousthai to appro­pri­ate, from idios

Date: 1588

1 a : the lan­guage pecu­liar to a peo­ple or to a dis­trict, com­mu­nity, or class : DIALECT b : the syn­tac­ti­cal, gram­mat­i­cal, or struc­tural form pecu­liar to a lan­guage
2 : an expres­sion in the usage of a lan­guage that is pecu­liar to itself either gram­mat­i­cally (as no, it wasn’t me) or in hav­ing a mean­ing that can­not be derived from the con­joined mean­ings of its ele­ments (as Monday week for “the Monday a week after next Monday”)
3 : a style or form of artis­tic expres­sion that is char­ac­ter­is­tic of an indi­vid­ual, a period or move­ment, or a medium or instru­ment <the mod­ern jazz idiom>; broadly : MANNER, STYLE <a new culi­nary idiom>

By per­mis­sion. From Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate® Dictionary at www.m-w.com by
Merriam-Webster, Incorporated.

Idiom Links

• 1-language.com — ESL site


• Action Verb Idioms


• American Idioms


• Ancient Chinese Idioms


• Color-related Idioms


• Czech Idioms


• ESL Idiom Cafe


• English-German Idioms


• English Idioms and Proverbs


• French Expressions and Idioms


• GoEnglish.com Idiom Dictionary


• Idioms and Expressions


• Idioms from Around the World: Definition of Common terms


• Idiom Site


• An Introduction to “Befogging” Idioms: Dimitrios Thanasoulas, B.A.
• Linguarama


• Paint by Idioms: Funbrain


• Personal Feelings & Opinions Idioms


• Portugese Idioms


• Wayne Magnuson English Idioms, Sayings and Slang