academic vocabulary/ defining your terms
For homework, look up words on the Academic Word List which you’ve never seen before and write definitions for at least ten of them, using different phrases from below for each definition.
… is a specialised term within the field of…, used to mean…
… can mean…but it also means…
… defines… as…
… has both the meaning of… and…
… is a somewhat ambiguous/ problematic term, but we can…
… is often used with the specific meaning of… but it also has the more general meaning of…
… tends to mean…
… was formerly/ originally defined as … but more recently…
…, which means…,….
A somewhat simplistic definition of… is…
According to…,… is…
Although in common parlance this term is used to mean…, in this field it rather means….
As well as the meaning of…,… also has the meaning of…
I’m going to follow… in taking… to mean…
In the field of…,…
In…contexts…tends to mean…
Most people in this field take… to mean…
One possible definition of… is…
Perhaps the best definition of… is provided by… in…
Perhaps the clearest definition of this is…
The (Oxford Advanced Learner’s) dictionary definition of… is… (but its actual use is more like…)
The acknowledged authority on… is…, who defines it as…
The core mean of… is…
The fundamental meaning of… is…
The literal meaning of… but in normal parlance it means…
The origins of the term lie in… but…
The various meanings of… include…
There are a number of possible definitions of…, of which the most useful/ relevant here is…
There are several/ many meanings to the term…, but…
There are two related meanings to…, one of which is…. The other is…
This concept can also be said to cover…
Unlike the everyday English use, the technical meaning of… is…
Read out a definition, see if your partner can say what vocabulary from the Academic Word List it matches, discuss if your definition could be improved, then take turns doing the same.
Ask about any phrases above you are not sure how to use, working together to match the phrases to vocabulary from the AWL each time.
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