transposition

1. 1.

   any abnormal position of the organs of the body

   Synonymsheterotaxy

   Broaderabnormality
2. 2.

   an event in which one thing is substituted for another

   “the replacement of lost blood by a transfusion of donor blood”

   Synonymssubstitutionpermutationreplacementswitch

   Broadervariation
3. 3.

   (genetics) a kind of mutation in which a chromosomal segment is transfered to a new position on the same or another chromosome

   Broadermutation

   genetics

4. 4.

   (mathematics) the transfer of a quantity from one side of an equation to the other along with a change of sign

   Broadercalculation

   algebra

5. 5.

   (electricity) a rearrangement of the relative positions of power lines in order to minimize the effects of mutual capacitance and inductance

   “he wrote a textbook on the electrical effects of transposition”

   Broaderrearrangement

   electricity

6. 6.

   the act of reversing the order or place of

   Synonymsreversal

   Broaderreordering
7. 7.

   (music) playing in a different key from the key intended; moving the pitch of a piece of music upwards or downwards

   Broaderplaying

   music

Other forms of transposition

plural

transpositions·

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.

Questions about transposition

What does transposition mean?

transposition means "any abnormal position of the organs of the body". That is the primary sense; the word has 7 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in transposition?

transposition has 5 syllables: tran-spo-si-ti-on. The stress falls on "ti".

What is another word for transposition?

Close synonyms include heterotaxy, substitution, permutation, replacement, switch. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is transposition a common word?

transposition is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.