DEFINITION:

• There are a  number of ways you can develop a paper using a definition.  But before looking at the particular means by which definition is accomplished, you need to understand what the term DEFINITION means.

• Here then is a definition of DEFINITION:

  DEFINITION is the formal statement of the meaning or significance of a word or phrase.

   

• Normally, when seeking to find the meaning of a word, you look to the dictionary; one purpose of which is to provide a convenient reference to the meaning of the more than 500,000 words in the English language.

• If you stop to think about it, DEFINITION is a particular application of EXPOSITION, the kind of writing which has EXPLANATION as its purpose.

  Why?

• DEFINITION, in the final analysis, is one type of explanation: it explains the meaning of a word or phrase.

• As a writer, you may want – or need – to define the meaning of words for your readers. Many English words have more than one meaning, and it can be important for the reader to know in exactly which sense YOU are using any given word.

• Sometimes you may use words, the meanings of which (1) are not universally agreed to or (2) deal with concepts that are so abstract or general that you need to pinpoint for the reader their precise meanings.

  • "LOVE," for example, is a term that is so general that it may be used to explain many related, but different, emotions and relationships: 

    • the love of a man for a woman, or the love of a mother for her child, and so on.

  • If you are writing on this subject, explaining the particular type of "love" you mean can be important in helping the reader understand your specific message.

  • Sometimes the kind of "love" you mean will be clear from the context in which it appears. At other times, you may want to define the term.

• Entire paragraphs – or papers – can be written to explain the meaning of a term.

  • Long definitions are called "extended" definitions,

  • and these may include such methods of development as detail, examples, illustrations, or reasons.

• This paragraph is an example of an EXTENDED DEFINITION:

  Parliamentary Law refers originally to the customs and rules for conducting business in the English Parliament, and thence to the usages of deliberative assemblies, in general. In England, these usages form a part of the unwritten law of the land, and in our own deliberative bodies, they are the procedural authority in all cases where they do not conflict with the rules or precedents which an assembly has adopted for itself.

• Remember these two points:
  1. DEFINITION is the process of EXPLAINING the meaning of a word or phrase.
  2. EXTENDED DEFINITION is a long definition which may incorporate a number of the methods of development available for all expository writing.

3 Types of Definition:  (links)

1. By Classification (Formal Definition)
2. By Synonyms
3. By Enumeration

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