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say it: KER-uhk-tur-ahyz
characterize is a verb meaning "describe or portray the character or the qualities or peculiarities of". It is pronounced /ˈkɛɹəktɚˌaɪz/ — KER-uhk-tur-ahyz. It carries 2 recorded senses.
describe or portray the character or the qualities or peculiarities of
“You can characterize his behavior as that of an egotist”
“This poem can be characterized as a lament for a dead lover”
be characteristic of
“What characterizes a Venetian painting?”
Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.
Definitions, synonyms and semantic relations for characterize come from Princeton University’s WordNet. The pronunciation comes from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. Commonness is measured against a corpus of everyday English. Full sources and licences.