different between speak vs screech
speak
English
Alternative forms
- speake (obsolete)
Etymology
From Middle English speken (“to speak”), from Old English specan (“to speak”), alteration of earlier sprecan (“to speak”), from Proto-West Germanic *sprekan, from Proto-Germanic *sprekan? (“to speak, make a sound”), from Proto-Indo-European *spreg- (“to make a sound, utter, speak”).
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /spi?k/
- (General American) enPR: sp?k, IPA(key): /spik/
- Rhymes: -i?k
Verb
speak (third-person singular simple present speaks, present participle speaking, simple past spoke or (archaic) spake, past participle spoken or (colloquial, nonstandard) spoke)
- (intransitive) To communicate with one's voice, to say words out loud.
- (intransitive, reciprocal) To have a conversation.
- (by extension) To communicate or converse by some means other than orally, such as writing or facial expressions.
- (intransitive) To deliver a message to a group; to deliver a speech.
- (transitive) To be able to communicate in a language.
- (by extension) To be able to communicate in the manner of specialists in a field.
- (by extension) To be able to communicate in the manner of specialists in a field.
- (transitive) To utter.
- (transitive) To communicate (some fact or feeling); to bespeak, to indicate.
- 1785, Frances Burney, Diary and letters of Madame d'Arblay, author of Evelina, Cecilia, &c., link:
- Their behaviour to each other speaks the most cordial confidence and happiness.
- 1785, Frances Burney, Diary and letters of Madame d'Arblay, author of Evelina, Cecilia, &c., link:
- (informal, transitive, sometimes humorous) To understand (as though it were a language).
- (intransitive) To produce a sound; to sound.
- Of a bird, to be able to vocally reproduce words or phrases from a human language.
- (transitive, archaic) To address; to accost; to speak to.
- [He will] thee in hope; he will speak thee fair.
- 1842, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Threnody in "Poems", published 1847, page 239
- Each village senior paused to scan / And speak the lovely caravan.
- 2013, George Francis Dow, Slave Ships and Slaving (quoting an older text)
- Spoke the ship Union of Newport, without any anchor. The next day ran down to Acra, where the windlass was again capsized and the pawls broken.
Usage notes
- Saying that one speaks a language often means that one can or knows how to speak it ("I speak Italian"); similarly, "I don't speak Italian" usually means that one cannot, rather than that one chooses not to.
Synonyms
- articulate, talk, verbalize
Antonyms
- be silent
Derived terms
Coordinate terms
- sign
Related terms
- speech
Translations
Noun
speak (countable and uncountable, plural speaks)
- language, jargon, or terminology used uniquely in a particular environment or group.
- Corporate speak; IT speak.
- Speech, conversation.
Derived terms
Translations
Noun
speak (plural speaks)
- (dated) a low class bar, a speakeasy.
Anagrams
- Akpes, Paeks, Pasek, Peaks, Spake, kapes, peaks, spake
Scots
Etymology
From Old English sprecan
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): [sp?k]
- (North Northern Scots) IPA(key): [sp?k]
Verb
speak (third-person singular present speaks, present participle speakin, past spak, past participle spoken)
- to speak
Derived terms
speak From the web:
- what speakers fit my car
- what speaker wire to use
- what speakers work with alexa
- what speakers work with roku tv
- what speaks primordial 5e
- what speaks without a mouth
- what speaker wire is positive
- what speakers work with audio technica turntable
screech
English
Etymology
1602; altered with expressive vowel lengthening from earlier skrech (1577), variant of obsolete scritch, from Middle English skriken, shrichen, schrichen (1250), from Old English (attested as scriccettan) and Old Norse skríkja, both from Proto-Germanic *skr?kijan? (compare Icelandic skríkja, Old Saxon scric?n, Danish skrige, Swedish skrika), derivative of *skr?han? (compare Middle Dutch schriën, German schreien, Low German dial. schrien, schriegen), ultimately of imitative origin.
Pronunciation
- enPR: skr?ch, IPA(key): /sk?i?t?/
- (UK) IPA(key): [sk?i?t?]
- (US) IPA(key): [sk?it?]
- Rhymes: -i?t?
Noun
screech (countable and uncountable, plural screeches)
- A high-pitched strident or piercing sound, such as that between a moving object and any surface.
- A harsh, shrill cry, as of one in acute pain or in fright; a shriek; a scream.
- 1826, Mary Shelley, The Last Man, volume 3, chapter 6
- That the night owl should sreech before the noonday sun, that the bat should wheel around the bad of beauty [...]
- 1826, Mary Shelley, The Last Man, volume 3, chapter 6
- (Newfoundlander, uncountable) Newfoundland rum.
- A form of home-made rye whiskey made from used oak rye barrels from a distillery.
Derived terms
Translations
Verb
screech (third-person singular simple present screeches, present participle screeching, simple past and past participle screeched)
- To make such a sound.
- (intransitive, figuratively) to travel very fast, as if making the sounds of brakes being released
Translations
Anagrams
- creches, crèches
screech From the web:
- what screeches
- what screeches at night
- what screech owls eat
- what screech owl sound like
- what screeches at night uk
- what's screech doing now
- what screeches in minecraft
- screech meaning
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