Definition:
A familiar grouping of words, especially words that habitually appear together and thereby convey meaning by association. See also:
Etymology:
From the Latin, "place together"Examples and Observations:
- "The mule has more horse sense than a horse. He knows when to stop eating--and he knows when to stop working."
(Harry S Truman) - "The acting buildings commissioner . . . said in a statement, 'The Buildings Department will have zero tolerance for builders, contractors, and property owners who fail to take appropriate measures to secure their construction sites and buildings.'"
(Sewell Chan, "Buildings Department Warns of High Winds," The New York Times, June 16, 2008) - "Collocations and clichés are strings of words that are remembered as wholes and often used together, such as gone with the wind or like two peas in a pod. People know tens of thousands of these expressions; the linguist Ray Jackendoff refers to them as 'the Wheel of Fortune lexicon,' after the game show in which contestants guess a familiar expression from a few fragments."
(Steven Pinker, Words and Rules, HarperCollins, 1999) - "Every lexeme has collocations, but some are much more predictable than others. Blond collocates strongly with hair, flock with sheep, neigh with horse. Some collocations are totally predictable, such as spick with span, or addled with brains . . .. Others are much less so: letter collocates with a wide range of lexemes, such as alphabet and spelling, and (in another sense) box, post, and write. . . .
"Collocations should not be confused with 'association of ideas.' The way lexemes work together may have nothing to do with 'ideas.' We say in English green with jealousy (not blue or red), though there is nothing literally 'green' about 'jealousy.'"
(David Crystal, How Language Works, Overlook Press, 2005)
Pronunciation: KOL-oh-KAY-shun
