DICTION

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does diction mean? 

• DICTION (noun)
  The noun DICTION has 2 senses:

1. the articulation of speech regarded from the point of view of its intelligibility to the audience

2. the manner in which something is expressed in words

  Familiarity information: DICTION used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• DICTION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The articulation of speech regarded from the point of view of its intelligibility to the audience

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

diction; enunciation

Hypernyms ("diction" is a kind of...):

articulation (the aspect of pronunciation that involves bringing articulatory organs together so as to shape the sounds of speech)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "diction"):

mumbling (indistinct enunciation)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The manner in which something is expressed in words

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

choice of words; diction; phraseology; phrasing; verbiage; wording

Context example:

use concise military verbiage

Hypernyms ("diction" is a kind of...):

expression; formulation (the style of expressing yourself)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "diction"):

mot juste (the appropriate word or expression)

verbalisation; verbalization (the words that are spoken in the activity of verbalization)

 Context examples 

The original was all her own—her own happy thoughts and gentle diction.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

Come, Miss Morland, let us leave him to meditate over our faults in the utmost propriety of diction, while we praise Udolpho in whatever terms we like best.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

But all the time he was oppressed by the consciousness that this carefulness of diction was making a booby of him, preventing him from expressing what he had in him.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)