juncture

[ juhngk-cher ]
See synonyms for: juncturejunctures on Thesaurus.com

noun
  1. a point of time, especially one made critical or important by a concurrence of circumstances: At this juncture, we must decide whether to stay or to walk out.

  2. a serious state of affairs; crisis: The matter has reached a juncture and a decision must be made.

  1. the line or point at which two bodies are joined; joint or articulation; seam.

  2. the act of joining.

  3. the state of being joined.

  4. something by which two things are joined.

  5. Phonetics.

    • a pause or other phonological feature or modification of a feature, as the lengthening of a preceding phoneme or the strengthening of a following one, marking a transition or break between sounds, especially marking the phonological boundary of a word, clause, or sentence: it is present in such words as night-rate and re-seed and absent in such words as nitrate and recede.: Compare close juncture, open juncture, terminal juncture.

    • the point in a word or group of words at which such a pause or other junctural marker occurs.

Origin of juncture

1
First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English, from Latin junctūra, equivalent to junct(us) (see junction) + -ūra -ure

synonym study For juncture

1, 3. See junction.

Words that may be confused with juncture

Words Nearby juncture

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use juncture in a sentence

British Dictionary definitions for juncture

juncture

/ (ˈdʒʌŋktʃə) /


noun
  1. a point in time, esp a critical one (often in the phrase at this juncture)

  2. linguistics

    • a pause in speech or a feature of pronunciation that introduces, accompanies, or replaces a pause

    • the set of phonological features signalling a division between words, such as those that distinguish a name from an aim

  1. a less common word for junction

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Idioms and Phrases with juncture

juncture

see at this point (juncture).

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.