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say it: LIB-ur-uhl
liberal is an adjective and noun meaning "showing or characterized by broad-mindedness". It is pronounced /ˈlɪˌbɝəl/ — LIB-ur-uhl. It carries 7 recorded senses.
showing or characterized by broad-mindedness
“a broad political stance”
“generous and broad sympathies”
“a liberal newspaper”
“tolerant of his opponent's opinions”
having political or social views favoring reform and progress
tolerant of change; not bound by authoritarianism, orthodoxy, or tradition
given or giving freely
“was a big tipper”
“the bounteous goodness of God”
“bountiful compliments”
“a freehanded host”
“a handsome allowance”
“Saturday's child is loving and giving”
“a liberal backer of the arts”
“a munificent gift”
“her fond and openhanded grandfather”
a person who favors a political philosophy of progress and reform and the protection of civil liberties
a person who favors an economic theory of laissez-faire and self-regulating markets
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 liberal 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.