different between little vs passing
little
English
Etymology
From Middle English litel, from Old English l?tel, from Proto-Germanic *l?tilaz (“tending to stoop, crouched, little”), from Proto-Indo-European *lewd- (“to bend, bent, small”), equivalent to lout +? -le. Cognate with Dutch luttel, regional German lütt and lützel, West Frisian lyts, Low German lütt, Old High German luzzil, Middle High German lützel, Old English l?tan (“to bow, bend low”); and perhaps to Old English lytig (“deceitful, lot deceit”), Gothic ???????????????????? (liuts, “deceitful”), ???????????????????????? (lutjan, “to deceive”); compare also Icelandic lítill (“little”), Swedish liten, Danish liden, lille, Gothic ???????????????????????????? (leitils), which appear to have a different root vowel. More at lout.
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /?l?t?l/, [?l?tl?], [?l?.t???]
- (General American) IPA(key): /?l?tl?/, [?l?.???], [???.??]
- (General New Zealand) IPA(key): /?l?tl?/
- (General Australian) IPA(key): /?l?.???/
- Rhymes: -?t?l
- Hyphenation: lit?tle
- Homophone: Littell
Adjective
little (comparative less or lesser or littler, superlative least or littlest)
- Small in size.
- Insignificant, trivial.
- (offensive) Used to belittle a person.
- (offensive) Used to belittle a person.
- Very young.
- (of a sibling) Younger.
- (also Little) Used with the name of a place, especially of a country or its capital, to denote a neighborhood whose residents or storekeepers are from that place.
- 1871 October 18, The One-eyed Philosopher [pseudonym], "Street Corners", in Judy: or the London serio-comic journal, volume 9, page 255 [1]:
- If you want to find Little France, take any turning on the north side of Leicester square, and wander in a zigzag fashion Oxford Streetwards. The Little is rather smokier and more squalid than the Great France upon the other side of the Manche.
- 2004, Barry Miles, Zappa: A Biography, 2005 edition, ?ISBN, page 5:
- In the forties, hurdy-gurdy men could still be heard in all those East Coast cities with strong Italian neighbourhoods: New York, Baltimore, Philadelphia and Boston. A visit to Baltimore's Little Italy at that time was like a trip to Italy itself.
- 2020, Richa Bhosale, "Croatian Hall in need of repairs to remain open," Timmins Daily Press:
- "The theatre was bought by the Croatian immigrants as so many immigrants came here in the ’30s and mostly for mining jobs, but in Schumacher itself it was called little Zagreb, and Zagreb is the capital city of Croatia. There were so many of them that they wanted to have their own little community, so they bought the theatre and they renovated it at that time, remodelled it and made it into a Croatian Hall," she explained.
- 1871 October 18, The One-eyed Philosopher [pseudonym], "Street Corners", in Judy: or the London serio-comic journal, volume 9, page 255 [1]:
- Having few members.
- Short in duration; brief.
- I feel better after my little sleep.
- Small in extent of views or sympathies; narrow; shallow; contracted; mean; illiberal; ungenerous.
- The long-necked geese of the world that are ever hissing dispraise, / Because their natures are little.
- 2001, Nicholas Petsalis-Diomidis, The Unknown Callas: the Greek Years, pg 547.
- Showing unmistakably what a little person he really was, in June 1949 he wrote his newly married daughter with nauseating disregard for the truth
Usage notes
Some authorities regard both littler and littlest as non-standard. The OED says of the word little: "the adjective has no recognized mode of comparison. The difficulty is commonly evaded by resort to a synonym (as smaller, smallest); some writers have ventured to employ the unrecognized forms littler, littlest, which are otherwise confined to dialect or imitations of childish or illiterate speech." The forms lesser and least are encountered in animal names such as lesser flamingo and least weasel.
Antonyms
- (small): large, big
- (young): big
- (younger): big
Derived terms
Translations
Adverb
little (comparative less or lesser, superlative least)
- Not much.
- We slept very little last night.
- Little disappointed, then, she turned attention to "Chat of the Social World," gossip which exercised potent fascination upon the girl's intelligence. She devoured with more avidity than she had her food those pretentiously phrased chronicles of the snobocracy […] distilling therefrom an acid envy that robbed her napoleon of all its savour.
- Not at all.
Antonyms
- much
Translations
Determiner
little (comparative less, superlative least)
- Not much, only a little: only a small amount (of).
- There is (very) little water left.
- We had very little to do.
Usage notes
- Little is used with uncountable nouns, few with plural countable nouns.
- Little can be used with or without an article. With the indefinite article, the emphasis is that there is indeed some, albeit not much:
- We have a little money, so we'll probably get by.
- With no article or the definite article (or what), the emphasis is on the scarcity:
- We have little money, and little hope of getting more.
- The little (or What little) money we have is all going to pay for food and medication, so we can't save any.
See also
- a little
Antonyms
- (not much): much
Translations
Pronoun
little
- Not much; not a large amount.
- Little is known about his early life.
Noun
little (plural littles)
- A small amount.
- Can I try a little of that sauce?
- Many littles make a mickle. (Scottish proverb)
- Little did he do to make me comfortable.
- If you want some cake, there's a little in the refrigerator
- (BDSM, slang) The participant in ageplay who acts out the younger role.
- (colloquial, college slang) A newly initiated member of a sorority.
Antonyms
- (BDSM): big
Derived terms
- little space
Related terms
- a little
- li'l, li'l', lil
- little by little
- little old
- belittle (cognate verb)
Anagrams
- tillet
little From the web:
- what little women character are you
- what little boys are made of
- what little wonder
- what little girl
- what little woman died
- what little island is in the allstate commercial
passing
English
Etymology
From pass +? -ing.
Pronunciation
- (UK) IPA(key): /?p??s??/
Verb
passing
- present participle of pass
Descendants
- Japanese: ????? (passhingu)
Adjective
passing (comparative more passing, superlative most passing)
- That passes away; ephemeral. [from 14th c.]
- 1814, Lord Byron, Lara, I.15:
- And solace sought he none from priest nor leech, / And soon the same in movement and in speech / As heretofore he fill'd the passing hours […]
- 2010, Marianne Kirby, The Guardian, 21 Sep 2010:
- It might be possible to dismiss #dittowatch as just another passing internet fancy. After all, hashtags are ephemeral.
- 1814, Lord Byron, Lara, I.15:
- (now rare, literary) Pre-eminent, excellent, extreme. [from 14th c.]
- 1835, Washington Irving, The Crayon Miscellany:
- It was by dint of passing strength, / That he moved the massy stone at length.
- 1847, Robert Holmes, The Case of Ireland Stated:
- That parliament was destined, in one short hour of convulsive strength, in one short hour of passing glory, to humble the pride and alarm the fears of England.
- 1835, Washington Irving, The Crayon Miscellany:
- Vague, cursory. [from 18th c.]
- 2011, Stewart J Lawrence, The Guardian, 14 Jun 2011:
- Ardent pro-lifer Rick Santorum made one passing reference to "authenticity" as a litmus test for a conservative candidate, but if he was obliquely referring to Romney (and he was), you could be excused for missing the dig.
- 2011, Stewart J Lawrence, The Guardian, 14 Jun 2011:
- Going past.
Translations
Adverb
passing (not comparable)
- (literary or archaic) Surpassingly, greatly. [from 14th c.]
- 2010 October 30, Simon Hattenstone, The Guardian:
- I find it passing strange that convicts understand honest folk, but honest folk don't understand convicts.
- 2010 October 30, Simon Hattenstone, The Guardian:
Usage notes
- This use is sometimes misconstrued as meaning "vaguely" or "slightly" (perhaps by confusion with such phrases as "passing fancy", under Adjective, above), leading to formations such as "more than passing clever" etc.
Translations
Noun
passing (countable and uncountable, plural passings)
- Death, dying; the end of something. [from 14th c.]
- The fact of going past; a movement from one place to another or a change from one state to another. [from 14th c.]
- 1913, Oliver Onions, The Story of Louie
- And since he did not see Louie by the folding door, Louie knew that in his former passings and repassings he could not have seen her either.
- 1913, Oliver Onions, The Story of Louie
- (law) The act of approving a bill etc. [from 15th c.]
- (sports) The act of passing a ball etc. to another player. [from 19th c.]
- A form of juggling where several people pass props between each other, usually clubs or rings.
- (sociology) The ability of a person to be regarded as a member of an identity group or category different from their own.
- Coordinate term: pass
- 1963, Erving Goffman, 'Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity' , Ch.2 at p.57, 58 (page numbers per the Pelican Books 1976 reprint)
- When there is a discrepancy between an individual's actual social identity and his virtual one, it is possible for this fact to be known to us before we normals contact him, or to be quite evident when he presents himself before us. He is a discredited person, and it is mainly he I have been dealing with until now.
[...] However, when his differentness is not immediately apparent, and is not known beforehand, [...] he is a discreditable, not a discredited person [...]. The issue is [...] that of managing information about his failing. To display or not to display; to tell or not to tell; to let on or not to let on; to lie or not to lie; and in each case, to whom, how, when, and where.
[...] It is this second general issue, the management of undisclosed discrediting information about self, that I am focusing on in these notes - in brief, 'passing'.
- When there is a discrepancy between an individual's actual social identity and his virtual one, it is possible for this fact to be known to us before we normals contact him, or to be quite evident when he presents himself before us. He is a discredited person, and it is mainly he I have been dealing with until now.
Translations
French
Etymology
From English passing.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /p?.si?/
Noun
passing m (uncountable)
- (juggling) passing
- Le passing, ou comment jongler à plusieurs. (www.multiloisirs.com)
Further reading
- “passing” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).
passing From the web:
- what passing bells
- what passing out feels like
- what passing the bar means
- what passing score for sat
- what passing in college
- what passing score for act
- what passing gas means
- what passing a kidney stone is like
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