Library / English Dictionary

EVOKE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Call to mind

Example:

this remark evoked sadness

Synonyms:

evoke; paint a picture; suggest

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Hypernyms (to "evoke" is one way to...):

evince; express; show (give expression to)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "evoke"):

reek; smack; smell (have an element suggestive (of something))

imply; incriminate; inculpate (suggest that someone is guilty)

Sentence frame:

Something ----s something

Derivation:

evocation (imaginative re-creation)

evocative (serving to bring to mind)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Summon into action or bring into existence, often as if by magic

Example:

call down the spirits from the mountain

Synonyms:

arouse; bring up; call down; call forth; conjure; conjure up; evoke; invoke; put forward; raise; stir

Classified under:

Verbs of sewing, baking, painting, performing

Hypernyms (to "evoke" is one way to...):

call up; summon (cause to become available for use, either literally or figuratively)

Verb group:

call forth; evoke; kick up; provoke (evoke or provoke to appear or occur)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "evoke"):

anathemise; anathemize; bedamn; beshrew; curse; damn; imprecate; maledict (wish harm upon; invoke evil upon)

bless (give a benediction to)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Derivation:

evocation (calling up supposed supernatural forces by spells and incantations)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Deduce (a principle) or construe (a meaning)

Example:

We drew out some interesting linguistic data from the native informant

Synonyms:

draw out; educe; elicit; evoke; extract

Classified under:

Verbs of sewing, baking, painting, performing

Hypernyms (to "evoke" is one way to...):

construe; interpret; see (make sense of; assign a meaning to)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Sense 4

Meaning:

Evoke or provoke to appear or occur

Example:

Her behavior provoked a quarrel between the couple

Synonyms:

call forth; evoke; kick up; provoke

Classified under:

Verbs of sewing, baking, painting, performing

Hypernyms (to "evoke" is one way to...):

cause; do; make (give rise to; cause to happen or occur, not always intentionally)

Verb group:

arouse; bring up; call down; call forth; conjure; conjure up; evoke; invoke; put forward; raise; stir (summon into action or bring into existence, often as if by magic)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "evoke"):

pick (provoke)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Something ----s something

Derivation:

evocation (stimulation that calls up (draws forth) a particular class of behaviors)

Sense 5

Meaning:

Call forth (emotions, feelings, and responses)

Example:

evoke sympathy

Synonyms:

arouse; elicit; enkindle; evoke; fire; kindle; provoke; raise

Classified under:

Verbs of feeling

Hypernyms (to "evoke" is one way to...):

create; make (make or cause to be or to become)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "evoke"):

interest (excite the curiosity of; engage the interest of)

overcome; overpower; overtake; overwhelm; sweep over; whelm (overcome, as with emotions or perceptual stimuli)

bruise; hurt; injure; offend; spite; wound (hurt the feelings of)

shame (cause to be ashamed)

discomfit; discompose; disconcert; untune; upset (cause to lose one's composure)

anger (make angry)

excite (arouse or elicit a feeling)

excite; shake; shake up; stimulate; stir (stir the feelings, emotions, or peace of)

fire up; heat; ignite; inflame; stir up; wake (arouse or excite feelings and passions)

prick (to cause a sharp emotional pain)

infatuate (arouse unreasoning love or passion in and cause to behave in an irrational way)

rekindle (arouse again)

draw (elicit responses, such as objections, criticism, applause, etc.)

ask for; invite (increase the likelihood of)

strike a chord; touch a chord (evoke a reaction, response, or emotion)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s something

Derivation:

evocation (stimulation that calls up (draws forth) a particular class of behaviors)

evocative (serving to bring to mind)

Credits

 Context examples: 

The researchers found that contractions of the diaphragm muscle from a hiccup evoked a pronounced response in the brain's cortex—two large brainwaves followed by a third.

(Baby Hiccups Key to Brain Development, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

When once the law is evoked it cannot be stayed again, and this is just one of those cases where, for the credit of the college, it is most essential to avoid scandal.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

These features have evoked fascination and controversy since their 2011 discovery, as possible markers for unexpected liquid water or brine on an otherwise dry planet.

(Recurring Martian Streaks: Flowing Sand, Not Water?, NASA)

Charcoal portraits came next, and the entire family hung in a row, looking as wild and crocky as if just evoked from a coalbin.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Generally refers to relative simple learning situations in which a stimulus initially incapable of evoking a certain response acquires the ability to do so by repeated pairing with another stimulus that does elicit the response.

(Conditioning, NCI Thesaurus)

The hue of that portion of the visible spectrum lying between red and yellow, evoked in the human observer by radiant energy with wavelengths of approximately 590 to 630 nanometers; any of a group of colors between red and yellow in hue, of medium lightness and moderate saturation.

(Orange, NCI Thesaurus)

Prolonged excitation of GABAergic neurons in BNST by a chemogenetic method evoked a longer-lasting, sustained wakefulness state, and it was abolished by administering a dual orexin receptor blocker (antagonist) DORA 22 in advance, meaning that orexins are involved in this phenomenon.

(The Secret Connection between Anxiety, Sleep, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

The hue of that portion of the visible spectrum lying between green and indigo, evoked in the human observer by radiant energy with wavelengths of approximately 420 to 490 nanometers; any of a group of colors that may vary in lightness and saturation, whose hue is that of a clear daytime sky.

(Blue, NCI Thesaurus)

In particular, two regions of alpha-synuclein evoked reactions from T cells: a section that often contains mutations linked with PD, and a portion undergoing a chemical change that can lead to accumulation of the protein in the brain.

(Immune system may mount an attack in Parkinson’s disease, National Institutes of Health)

The hue of that portion of the visible spectrum lying between yellow and blue, evoked in the human observer by radiant energy with wavelengths of approximately 490 to 570 nanometers; any of a group of colors that may vary in lightness and saturation and whose hue is that of the emerald or somewhat less yellow than that of growing grass.

(Green, NCI Thesaurus)