different between bulldozer vs firebreak

English

Etymology

Originally bull-dozer (1875, Louisiana, US); bulldoze +? -er.

Pronunciation

• (US) IPA^(key): /?b?ldo?z?/

Noun

bulldozer (plural bulldozers)

1. A tractor with an attached blade for pushing earth and building debris for coarse preliminary surface grading, demolishing building structures, etc.
2. One who bulldozes.
3. (historical, chiefly in the plural) A member of a self-identified group of white US Southerners who colluded to influence outcomes of post-Reconstruction elections by intimidating, coercing and bullying black voters and legislators, including burning down houses and churches, flogging and murdering opponents.
4. (by extension) A bully; an overbearing individual.

Synonyms

• (member of intimidating white US Southerners): regulator

• blade (slang, 1940s and after)

Translations

Verb

bulldozer (third-person singular simple present bulldozers, present participle bulldozering, simple past and past participle bulldozered)

1. To bulldoze (push through forcefully).

Further reading

• bulldozer on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Danish

Etymology

Borrowed from English bulldozer.

Noun

bulldozer c (definite plural bulldozeren, indefinite plural bulldozere, definite plural bulldozerne)

1. a bulldozer (crawler tractor with an attached blade)

French

Etymology

From American English bulldozer.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bul.do.z??/, /byl.do.z??/

Noun

bulldozer m (plural bulldozers)

1. bulldozer

Further reading

• “bulldozer” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Spanish

Noun

bulldozer m (plural bulldozeres)

1. bulldozer

English

Alternative forms

• fire break

Etymology

fire +? break

Noun

firebreak (plural firebreaks)

1. An area cleared of all flammable material to prevent a fire from spreading across it.

   The firefighters used a bulldozer to clear a firebreak in the forest to try to contain the forest fire.

2. (figuratively) Any separating barrier.
   • 1984, Dietrich Schroeer, Science, Technology and the Nuclear Arms Race (page 293)

     That policy could consist of a statement that the declaring nation would not be the first to use nuclear weapons. This would strengthen the firebreak between the use of conventional and nuclear weapons.

   • 2012, Daniel Levine, Recovering International Relations: The Promise of Sustainable Critique (page 112)

     First, it serves to demonstrate that the practice of sustainable critique […] need not be impossibly philosophically rarefied […] Second, it serves as a firebreak against the unrelieved negativity that, it is sometimes charged, follows from Adorno's practices of reflexivity.

Translations

See also

• firebreak on Wikipedia.Wikipedia