emphasis means special weight or forcefulness given to something considered important. It carries an Arena rating of 1747, earned across 8 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, emphasis ranks #867 of 17,127 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #2,449 of 17,143 for Best Fossil-Poetry Words, #5,210 of 17,138 for Most Incisive Words, #5,611 of 17,126 for Most Elegant Words.
emphasis is pronounced /ˈɛmfəsɪs/.
Why “emphasis” is a great word
The special importance, value, or prominence given to something, often through stress in speech or visual distinctiveness in writing. From Latin emphasis, from Ancient Greek ἔμφασις (émphasis, "significance, indirect meaning"), from ἐμφαίνω (emphaínō, "to present, to indicate"), from ἐν- (en-, "in") + φαίνω (phaínō, "to show"); first recorded in English use 1565–75. Unlike "stress" (which denotes vocal prominence on a syllable) or "understatement" (which deliberately diminishes), emphasis is the act of making the essential unmistakable. It is the italic lean of slanted text, the sudden silence after cacophony, the single beam of light on an empty stage—a quiet violence done to a neutral field so one part bears the whole weight of meaning.
Etymology
From Latin emphasis, from Ancient Greek ἔμφασις (émphasis, “significance”), from ἐμφαίνω (emphaínō, “to present; to indicate”), from ἐν- (en-, “in”) + φαίνω (phaínō, “to show”).
noun
- Special weight or forcefulness given to something considered important.e.g.“He paused for emphasis before saying who had won.”
- Special attention or prominence given to something.e.g.“Anglia TV's emphasis is on Norwich and district.”
- Prominence given to a syllable or words, by raising the voice or printing in italic or underlined type.e.g.“He used a yellow highlighter to indicate where to give emphasis in his speech.”
- The phonetic or phonological feature that distinguishes emphatic consonants from other consonants.
- The use of boldface, italics, or other such formatting to highlight text.
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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