Adjacent Words

Usage definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

U'SAGE, n s as z. [See Use.]
1. Treatment; an action or series of actions performed by one person towards another, or which directly affect him; as good usage; ill usage; hard usage. Gentle usage will often effect what harsh usage will not. The elephant may be governed by mild usage.
2. Use, or long continued use; custom; practice. Uninterrupted usage for a long time, or immemorial usage constitutes prescription. Custom is a local usage; prescription is a personal usage. In language, usage is the foundation of all rules.
Of things once received and confirmed by use, long usage is a law sufficient.
3. Manners; behavior. Obs.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: the act of using; "he warned against the use of narcotic drugs"; "skilled in the utilization of computers" [syn: use, usage, utilization, utilisation, employment, exercise]
2: accepted or habitual practice [syn: custom, usage, usance]
3: the customary manner in which a language (or a form of a language) is spoken or written; "English usage"; "a usage borrowed from French"

Merriam Webster's

noun Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French, from us use Date: 14th century 1. a. firmly established and generally accepted practice or procedure b. a uniform certain reasonable lawful practice existing in a particular locality or occupation and binding persons entering into transactions chiefly on the basis of presumed familiarity c. the way in which words and phrases are actually used (as in a particular form or sense) in a language community 2. a. the action, amount, or mode of using <a decreased usage of electricity> b. manner of treating Synonyms: see habit

Oxford Reference Dictionary

n. 1 a manner of using or treating; treatment (damaged by rough usage). 2 habitual or customary practice, esp. as creating a right, obligation, or standard. Etymology: ME f. OF f. us USE n.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Usage Us"age, n. [F. usage, LL. usaticum. See Use.] 1. The act of using; mode of using or treating; treatment; conduct with respect to a person or a thing; as, good usage; ill usage; hard usage. My brother Is prisoner to the bishop here, at whose hands He hath good usage and great liberty. --Shak. 2. Manners; conduct; behavior. [Obs.] A gentle nymph was found, Hight Astery, excelling all the crew In courteous usage. --Spenser. 3. Long-continued practice; customary mode of procedure; custom; habitual use; method. --Chaucer. It has now been, during many years, the grave and decorous usage of Parliaments to hear, in respectful silence, all expressions, acceptable or unacceptable, which are uttered from the throne. --Macaulay. 4. Customary use or employment, as of a word or phrase in a particular sense or signification. 5. Experience. [Obs.] In eld [old age] is both wisdom and usage. --Chaucer. Syn: Custom; use; habit. Usage: Usage, Custom. These words, as here compared, agree in expressing the idea of habitual practice; but a custom is not necessarily a usage. A custom may belong to many, or to a single individual. A usage properly belongs to the great body of a people. Hence, we speak of usage, not of custom, as the law of language. Again, a custom is merely that which has been often repeated, so as to have become, in a good degree, established. A usage must be both often repeated and of long standing. Hence, we speak of a ``hew custom,'' but not of a ``new usage.'' Thus, also, the ``customs of society'' is not so strong an expression as the ``usages of society.'' ``Custom, a greater power than nature, seldom fails to make them worship.'' --Locke. ``Of things once received and confirmed by use, long usage is a law sufficient.'' --Hooker. In law, the words usage and custom are often used interchangeably, but the word custom also has a technical and restricted sense. See Custom, n., 3.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(usages) 1. Usage is the way in which words are actually used in particular contexts, especially with regard to their meanings. The word 'undertaker' had long been in common usage... He was a stickler for the correct usage of English. N-UNCOUNT: usu with supp 2. A usage is a meaning that a word has or a way in which it can be used. It's very definitely a usage which has come over to Britain from America. N-COUNT 3. Usage is the degree to which something is used or the way in which it is used. Parts of the motor wore out because of constant usage... If your water usage is very small it may be worthwhile opting for a meter. N-UNCOUNT: usu with supp

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

n. 1. Treatment. 2. Practice (long continued), custom, use, habit, prescription, method. 3. Customary use.

Moby Thesaurus

acceptance, acceptation, acception, active use, adjectival phrase, antonym, appliance, application, articulation, automatism, bad habit, bon ton, care, ceremony, characteristic, choice, choice of words, clause, composition, conformity, construction, consuetude, consumption, convenance, convention, creature of habit, custodianship, custom, dialect, diction, employ, employment, established way, etiquette, exercise, exertion, expression, fashion, folkway, force of habit, form, formality, formulation, free form, good use, grammar, guidance, guiding, habit, habit pattern, habitude, handling, hard usage, hard use, headed group, homograph, homonym, homophone, idiom, idiotism, ill use, language, langue, lead, lexeme, lingo, lingua, linguistic form, locution, logos, management, manipulation, manner, manner of speaking, manners, means of dealing, metonym, minimum free form, misuse, monosyllable, mores, noun phrase, observance, operation, paragraph, parlance, parole, pattern, peculiar expression, peculiarity, period, personal usage, phrasal idiom, phrase, phraseology, phrasing, polysyllable, practice, praxis, preference, prescription, procedure, proceeding, process, proper thing, received meaning, rhetoric, ritual, rough usage, routine, second nature, sentence, set phrase, social convention, speech, standard behavior, standard phrase, standard usage, standing custom, stereotype, stereotyped behavior, stewardship, syllable, synonym, syntactic structure, talk, term, time-honored practice, tongue, tradition, treatment, trick, turn of expression, turn of phrase, use, use of words, using up, usus loquendi, utterance, verb complex, verb phrase, verbalism, verbiage, verbum, vocable, way, way of speaking, what is done, wont, wonting, word, word-group, wordage, wording, wrong use