English adjective: short | |||
1. | short primarily temporal sense; indicating or being or seeming to be limited in duration | ||
Samples | A short life. A short flight. A short holiday. A short story. Only a few short months. | ||
Similar | abbreviated, brief, clipped, fleeting, fugitive, momentaneous, momentary, short and sweet, short-dated, short-range, short-run, short-term, shortened, truncated | ||
Attribute | duration, length | ||
Antonyms | long | ||
2. | short (primarily spatial sense) having little length or lacking in length | ||
Samples | Short skirts. Short hair. The board was a foot short. A short toss. | ||
Similar | abbreviated, brief, close, curtal, sawed-off, sawn-off, short-range, short-snouted, shortened, shortened, shortish, snub, stubby, telescoped, truncate, truncated | ||
Attribute | length | ||
Antonyms | long | ||
3. | short low in stature; not tall | ||
Samples | He was short and stocky. Short in stature. A short smokestack. A little man. | ||
Synonyms | little | ||
Similar | chunky, compact, dumpy, half-length, heavyset, low-set, pint-size, pint-sized, runty, sawed-off, sawn-off, short-stalked, squab, squabby, squat, squatty, stocky, stumpy, thick, thickset | ||
See also | low | ||
Attribute | height, stature | ||
Antonyms | tall | ||
4. | short not sufficient to meet a need | ||
Samples | An inadequate income. A poor salary. Money is short. On short rations. Food is in short supply. Short on experience. | ||
Synonyms | inadequate, poor | ||
Similar | deficient, insufficient | ||
Antonyms | sufficient | ||
5. | short (of memory) deficient in retentiveness or range | ||
Samples | A short memory. | ||
Synonyms | forgetful, unretentive | ||
See also | forgetful, mindless, unmindful | ||
Antonyms | recollective, retentive, tenacious, long | ||
6. | short not holding securities or commodities that one sells in expectation of a fall in prices | ||
Samples | A short sale. Short in cotton. | ||
Domain category | finance | ||
Antonyms | long | ||
7. | short of speech sounds or syllables of relatively short duration | ||
Samples | The English vowel sounds in `pat', `pet', `pit', `pot', putt' are short. | ||
Domain category | phonetics | ||
Antonyms | long | ||
8. | short less than the correct or legal or full amount often deliberately so | ||
Samples | A light pound. A scant cup of sugar. Regularly gives short weight. | ||
Synonyms | light, scant | ||
Similar | deficient, insufficient | ||
Antonyms | sufficient | ||
9. | short lacking foresight or scope | ||
Samples | A short view of the problem. Shortsighted policies. Shortsighted critics derided the plan. Myopic thinking. | ||
Synonyms | myopic, shortsighted, unforesightful | ||
Similar | improvident | ||
Antonyms | provident | ||
10. | short tending to crumble or break into flakes due to a large amount of shortening | ||
Samples | Shortbread is a short crumbly cookie. A short flaky pie crust. | ||
Similar | breakable | ||
Antonyms | unbreakable | ||
11. | short marked by rude or peremptory shortness | ||
Samples | Try to cultivate a less brusque manner. A curt reply. The salesgirl was very short with him. | ||
Synonyms | brusk, brusque, curt | ||
Similar | discourteous | ||
Antonyms | courteous | ||
English noun: short | |||
1. | short (artifact) the location on a baseball field where the shortstop is stationed | ||
Broader (hypernym) | parcel, parcel of land, piece of ground, piece of land, tract | ||
Part meronym | baseball diamond, diamond, infield | ||
2. | short (artifact) accidental contact between two points in an electric circuit that have a potential difference | ||
Synonyms | short circuit | ||
Broader (hypernym) | contact, tangency | ||
Part meronym | circuit, electric circuit, electrical circuit | ||
3. | short (act) the fielding position of the player on a baseball team who is stationed between second and third base | ||
Synonyms | shortstop | ||
Broader (hypernym) | position | ||
Member meronym | baseball team | ||
English adverb: short | |||
1. | short quickly and without warning | ||
Samples | He stopped suddenly. | ||
Synonyms | abruptly, dead, suddenly | ||
2. | short without possessing something at the time it is contractually sold | ||
Samples | He made his fortune by selling short just before the crash. | ||
Domain category | finance | ||
3. | short clean across | ||
Samples | The car's axle snapped short. | ||
4. | short at some point or distance before a goal is reached | ||
Samples | He fell short of our expectations. | ||
5. | short so as to interrupt | ||
Samples | She took him up short before he could continue. | ||
6. | short at a disadvantage | ||
Samples | I was caught short. | ||
Synonyms | unawares | ||
7. | short in a curt, abrupt and discourteous manner | ||
Samples | He told me curtly to get on with it. He talked short with everyone. He said shortly that he didn't like it. | ||
Synonyms | curtly, shortly | ||
English verb: short | |||
1. | short (social) cheat someone by not returning him enough money | ||
Synonyms | short-change | ||
Pattern of use | Somebody ----s somebody | ||
Broader (hypernym) | bunco, con, defraud, diddle, gip, goldbrick, gyp, hornswoggle, mulct, nobble, rook, scam, short-change, swindle, victimize | ||
2. | short (creation) create a short circuit in | ||
Synonyms | short-circuit | ||
Pattern of use | Somebody ----s something. Something ----s something | ||
Broader (hypernym) | create, make | ||