different between expressive vs needy

English

Etymology

From Middle French expressif

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?k?sp??s?v/
• Rhymes: -?s?v
• Hyphenation: ex?pres?sive

Adjective

expressive (comparative more expressive, superlative most expressive)

1. Effectively conveying thought or feeling.

Antonyms

• inexpressive
• unexpressive

Derived terms

• expressiveness

Related terms

• expressivity

Translations

Noun

expressive (plural expressives)

1. (linguistics) Any word or phrase that expresses (that the speaker, writer, or signer has) a certain attitude toward or information about the referent.
   • 2017, Tammi Leann Stout, An investigation of projection and temporal referencein Kaqchikel (dissertation for the University of Texas at Austin):

     Consider the case of expressives, where no prior knowledge of the speaker’s attitudes are required to interpret the utterance. In (43) ["That jerk Alexa keeps making me look bad"], Steve does not need to know (and in fact has no prior knowledge of) anything relating to Siri’s attitudes towards Alexa to interpret that Siri has a negative attitude about Alexa. It is the expressive that jerk that implies the negative attitude.

2. (linguistics, more narrowly) A word or phrase, belonging to a distinct word class or having distinct morphosyntactic properties, with semantic symbolism (for example, an onomatopoeia), variously considered either a synonym, a hypernym or a hyponym of ideophone.
   • 2004, Nicole Kruspe, A Grammar of Semelai (?ISBN), page 396:

     Cross-linguistically 'expressives' are more commonly termed 'ideophones' [...] Expressives are often cited as a distinctive shared feature of the Austroasiatic language family (Diffloth and Zide 1992; Osada 1992 (Mundari); Svantesson 1983 (Kammu)). [...] I do not make a distinction between expressives and ideophones. [...] I distinguish expressives from onomatopoeic forms, although the two probably overlap.

   • 2007, N. J. Enfield, A Grammar of Lao (?ISBN), page 299

     A native metalinguistic term toongl-toojl covers most of these, capturing a range of phenomena associated with alliterative, sound symbolic, and poetic expression. This chapter describes expressive structures under the headings ideophones, onomatopoeia, four-syllable rhyming expressions, echo formation, and interjections.

     12.1 Ideophones

     The term ideophone is roughly equivalent to the term expressive, as well as other terms mimetic and psychomime.

   • 2015, The Munda Languages (Gregory D. S. Anderson, ?ISBN), page 139:

     The term 'expressive' was suggested by Diffloth (1976:263–264) and adopted by Emeneau (1980:7) in the South Asian context in the following:

     ‘(E)xpressive’ is the most inclusive term for a form class with semantic symbolism and distinct morphosyntactic properties; ‘ideophones’ are a subclass in which the symbolism is phonological; ‘onomaptoetics’ are ideophones in which the reference of the symbolism is acoustic (i.e. imitative of sounds). Since the ideophones may have reference not only to sounds, but to any other objects of sense, including internal feelings as well as external perceptions (sight, taste, smell, etc.), and since the Indo-Aryan/Dravidian items already examined have this very wide type of reference, the broadest term ‘expressives’ seems appropriate.

   • 2017, Sam Gray, Classifications of Mundari Expressives and Other Reduplicated Structures (thesis):

     I examine the valency of expressives, a class of ideophones in Mundari, comparing their behaviors as predicates to those of reduplicated verb forms.

Further reading

• expressive in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• expressive in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

French

Adjective

expressive

1. feminine singular of expressif

German

Adjective

expressive

1. inflection of expressiv:
   1. strong/mixed nominative/accusative feminine singular
   2. strong nominative/accusative plural
   3. weak nominative all-gender singular
   4. weak accusative feminine/neuter singular

English

Etymology

From Middle English nedy, nedi (“necessitous”), from Old English n?di?, *n?edi? ("of need, obligated, compelled"; found in the derivative n?edi?nes (“obligation”)), from Proto-Germanic *naudigaz (“of need, forced, compelled”), equivalent to need +? -y. Cognate with Scots nedy, neidy (“needy, necessitous, impoverished”), Saterland Frisian niedich (“miserable, poor, wretched, needy”), Saterland Frisian nöödich (“necessary, needful”), West Frisian nedich (“needful, needed”), Dutch nodig (“necessary”), Middle Low German n?dich (“necessary, urgent, by requirement”), German nötig (“necessary, needful”), Danish nødig (“necessary”), Swedish nödig (“necessary”), Icelandic nauðugur (“constrained”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?ni?di/
• Rhymes: -i?di

Adjective

needy (comparative needier, superlative neediest)

1. In need; poor.

   Needy people want to give too, but have few material goods to offer.

   • 29 February 2012, Aidan Foster-Carter, BBC News North Korea: The denuclearisation dance resumes [1]

     Such monitoring has often been a sticking point in the past, amid fears that food aid might be diverted to the Northern elite - or its military - rather than the needy.

2. Desiring constant affirmation; lacking self-confidence.

   It's emotionally exhausting to be around her because she's so needy.

3. (archaic) Needful; necessary.
   • 1861, Isaak August Dorner, Patrick Fairbairn, History of the development of the doctrine of the person of Christ

     It is the measure of things, and their time (that is, their measure, as to space and time), and yet it is above, and prior to, time: it is full in needy things, and overflows in full things; it is unutterable, innominable: it is above understanding […]

Synonyms

• (in need): See also Thesaurus:impoverished

Antonyms

• (desiring constant affirmation): confident, self-sufficient

Derived terms

• neediness

Translations

Anagrams

• Edney