Library / English Dictionary

NEUTER

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

A gender that refers chiefly (but not exclusively) to inanimate objects (neither masculine nor feminine)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Hypernyms ("neuter" is a kind of...):

gender; grammatical gender (a grammatical category in inflected languages governing the agreement between nouns and pronouns and adjectives; in some languages it is quite arbitrary but in Indo-European languages it is usually based on sex or animateness)

Derivation:

neuter (remove the ovaries of)

neuter (of grammatical gender)

 II. (adjective) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Of grammatical gender

Example:

'it' is the third-person singular neuter pronoun

Classified under:

Adjectives

Antonym:

feminine; masculine (of grammatical gender)

Derivation:

neuter (a gender that refers chiefly (but not exclusively) to inanimate objects (neither masculine nor feminine))

Sense 2

Meaning:

Having no or imperfectly developed or nonfunctional sex organs

Synonyms:

neuter; sexless

Classified under:

Adjectives

Similar:

asexual; nonsexual (not having or involving sex)

 III. (verb) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

Remove the ovaries of

Example:

Is your cat spayed?

Synonyms:

alter; castrate; neuter; spay

Classified under:

Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care

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

desex; desexualise; desexualize; fix; sterilise; sterilize; unsex (make infertile)

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

defeminise; defeminize (remove the ovaries of (female mammals such as cats))

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody

Derivation:

neuter (a gender that refers chiefly (but not exclusively) to inanimate objects (neither masculine nor feminine))

Credits