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ASKING
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
The verbal act of requesting
Synonyms:
asking; request
Classified under:
Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents
Hypernyms ("asking" is a kind of...):
speech act (the use of language to perform some act)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "asking"):
notice; notification (a request for payment)
indirect request; wish (an expression of some desire or inclination)
invitation (a request (spoken or written) to participate or be present or take part in something)
appeal; entreaty; prayer (earnest or urgent request)
orison; petition; prayer (reverent petition to a deity)
call (a request)
billing; charge (request for payment of a debt)
trick or treat (a request by children on Halloween; they pass from door to door asking for goodies and threatening to play tricks on those who refuse)
inquiring; questioning (a request for information)
order (a request for something to be made, supplied, or served)
callback; recall (a request by the manufacturer of a defective product to return the product (as for replacement or repair))
II. (verb)
Sense 1
-ing form of the verb ask
Context examples:
A question asking an individual to state the current time, to within 1 hour.
(About What Time is it, NCI Thesaurus)
I'm not asking about mere suspiciousness; I am interested if the patient is convinced that these things are happening to him/her.
(NPI - Have Beliefs That You Know are Not True, NCI Thesaurus)
It was a surprise to me, therefore, to hear him asking Holmes in an eager voice whether he had made any advance in his reconstruction of this mysterious episode.
(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
What do you mean by asking me such a question?
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
You came in as the knight does in the jongleur's romances, between dragon and damsel, with small time for the asking of questions.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Self-reports of calcium intake were collected using a questionnaire asking about the frequency with which people ate calcium-rich foods and whether they regularly used calcium supplements in the past year.
(No evidence that calcium increases risk of age-related macular degeneration, National Institutes of Health)
That may mean asking more details about the health history of women during pregnancy.
(First-time pregnancy complications linked to increased risk of hypertension later in life, National Institutes of Health)
Why, man, I could insult you by asking you to have something to eat.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
“There’s been a gentleman here asking for you, sir.”
(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
He said “he wondered at one thing very much, which was, to hear me speak so loud;” asking me “whether the king or queen of that country were thick of hearing?”
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
