metonymy

English

Etymology

From Late Latin metonymia, from Ancient Greek μετονομασία (metonomasía, “change of name”), from μετά (metá, “other”) + ὄνομα (ónoma, “name”).

Noun

metonymy (countable and uncountable, plural metonymies)

  1. The use of a single characteristic or name of an object to identify an entire object or related object.
    • 1891 September 1, William Minto, “Practical talks on writing English”, in Theodor Flood, editor, The Chautauquan, volume 13, OCLC 752442901, page 279:
      ...the principle of metonymy is simply to substitute for the plain name of a thing a name or phrase based on something connected with it.
  2. (countable) A metonym.
Examples
  • The White House released its official report today. — "The White House" for "The presidential administration"
  • The Crown has enacted a new social security policy. — "The Crown" for "The government of the United Kingdom".
  • A crowd of fifty heads — where "head" stands for person.
  • Put it on the plastic — material (plastic) for object (credit card)

Hypernyms

Hyponyms

Coordinate terms

Derived terms

Translations

References

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