elision
Americannoun
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the omission of a vowel, consonant, or syllable in pronunciation.
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(in verse) the omission of a vowel at the end of one word when the next word begins with a vowel, as th'angel.
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an act or instance of eliding or omitting anything.
noun
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the omission of a syllable or vowel at the beginning or end of a word, esp when a word ending with a vowel is next to one beginning with a vowel
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any omission of a part or parts
Etymology
Origin of elision
First recorded in 1575–85; from Latin ēlīsiōn- (stem of ēlīsiō ) a striking out, equivalent to ēlīs ( us ) (past participle of ēlīdere; see elide) + -iōn- -ion
Explanation
Leaving something out is an elision. If the movie version of your favorite book leaves out the most exciting plot line, it's because the director made an elision. Elision has its roots in the Latin word elidere, which means "to crush out." A government censor who blacks out the names of people or places in a document is making an elision, and so is an editor who removes passages from an article to make it shorter or clearer. The editor probably thinks of the elision as a clean, businesslike cut, but the writer might indeed feel crushed.
Vocabulary lists containing elision
Literary Devices & Figures of Speech - Advanced
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Reading: Literature - Literary Devices & Figures of Speech - High School
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Big Science
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
“Singing in Tongues” collects vocal and operatic music written by Lim between 1993 and 2008 — all of it handled persuasively by her longtime collaborators in the Elision Ensemble.
From New York Times • Dec. 30, 2021
Elision is rare, and there is little variety.
From Post-Augustan Poetry From Seneca to Juvenal by Butler, Harold Edgeworth
Elision marks indicate that parts of this letter are omitted.
From Benjamin Franklin Representative selections, with introduction, bibliograpy, and notes by Jorgenson, Chester E.
Elision is not common in Esperanto, except in poetry, where it is used, when required, for the purpose of rhythm.
From The International Auxiliary Language Esperanto Grammar and Commentary by Cox, George
Elision, the omission or crowding out of unstressed words or unaccented syllables to make the metre smoother; a term belonging to classical prosody and inappropriate in English prosody except where syllable-counting verse is concerned.
From The Principles of English Versification by Baum, Paull Franklin
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
