television

television
  (ˈtɛlɪvɪʒən, tɛlɪˈvɪʒən)
  [f. tele- + vision n.]
  1. a. A system for reproducing an actual or recorded scene at a distance on a screen by radio transmission, usu. with appropriate sounds; the vision of distant objects obtained thus.
  The term normally refers to a system of general transmission over the air, but it also includes systems of restricted transmission to subscribers by wire, such as cable television; see also closed circuit s.v. closed ppl. a. 3.

[1904 Daily News 3 June 7 Dr. Low talks very modestly of the ‘televista’ (the name he has given to his ‘seeing by wire’ invention).] 1907 Sci. Amer. Suppl. 15 June 26292/1 Now that the photo-telegraph invented by Prof. Korn is on the eve of being introduced into general practice, we are informed of some similar inventions in the same field, all of which tend to achieve some step toward the solution of the problem of television. 1909 Athenæum 25 Sept. 367/3 The efforts made by Prof. Rukmer of Berlin to realize ‘television’. 1913 Wireless World Sept. 353/2 The tele-vision,..being based upon the same principle as photo-telegraphy, is possible in itself. 1926 Glasgow Herald 20 Dec. 11/8 Mr. John L. Baird, a native of Helensburgh,..recently invented an apparatus which makes television possible. 1930 J. Buckingham Matter & Radiation 122 We have heard so much about Television lately that we are apt to forget that no portion of the apparatus used is novel to scientists. 1942 T. S. Eliot Music of Poetry 18 There are words which are ugly because of foreignness or ill⁓breeding (e.g. televison): but I do not believe that any word well-established in its own language is either beautiful or ugly. 1948 N. Wiener Cybernetics 10 Television was destined to be more useful to engineering by the introduction of such new techniques than as an independent industry. 1957 Technology Mar. 9/2 The solution of the major problems in colour television, the public introduction of which is now more a question of economics than of technical difficulty. 1970 Toronto Daily Star 24 Sept. 28/1 (Advt.), You can receive Channel 19 by..cable television. 1972 Times 21 Jan. 2/5 Cable televison was originally introduced in the area in 1962 to provide better reception because Shooters Hill in the south consistently interfered with Television pictures.

  b. Organized television broadcasting; the television broadcasting service as a whole or (with defining word) a particular television service. Phr. on (the) television.

1927 [see heebie-jeebies]. 1930 N. Coward Private Lives ii. 49 Aeroplanes..and Cosmic Atoms, and Television. 1938 Observer 26 June 12/6, I reviewed this film three weeks ago when I saw it on television. 1951 N.Y. Herald-Tribune 12 Dec. 27/3 Buster is an old playmate and I'm glad to see he..crashed television successfully. 1958, etc. [see independent a. 5 e]. 1962 Friend 1 June 665/1, I have sometimes thought how different life might have been at Haworth if only they had had the television, and Tide, and a Morris Minor. 1965 M. Drabble Millstone 194 You could get a job on the television. 1968 Globe & Mail (Toronto) 17 Feb. 36 (Advt.), Private balconies, cable television, off street parking. 1976 Jrnl. R. Soc. Arts June 365/2 Are there any recent figures of the cost to every household in the country of the advertising on independent television? 1980 Private Eye 26 Sept. 13/1 That ghastly woman with the teeth who's always on the television. 1982 Listener 16 Dec. 17/1, I have mixed feelings about cable television's ‘autumn of debate’.

  c. Television entertainment; television broadcasting considered as a medium of communication or as an art form. Cf. good a. 1 f.

1931 Daily Progress (Charlottesville, Va.) 2 May 3/4 The ceremony is television, but in every other way the wedding is absolutely regular. 1957 Observer 27 Oct. 17/4 It proved, as discussions on these emotive imponderabilia always do, highly absorbing television. 1977 Times 2 Sept. 7/3 Television, the art..that speaks daily to almost everybody. 1982 Sunday Tel. 3 Jan. 16/7 Attenborough's ‘Life on Earth’ was perfect television.

  2. A television set.

1955 Observer 28 Aug. 7/4 The South London landlady was seeking ‘a nice new television’. 1972 Daily Express 8 Jan. 12/4 We have never been able to afford a car but we do have a television. 1973 D. Francis Slay-Ride viii. 96 Behind me on a wide shelf stood my portable television. 1982 Sunday Sun-Times (Chicago) 3 Oct. 72/1 Industry workers last year averaged $75 a month. They buy televisions and send money home to wives.

  3. attrib. and Comb. a. In general uses, as television aerial, television antenna, television apparatus, television box, television channel, television coverage, television dealer, television frequency, television lounge, television receiver, television room, television screen, television service, television set, television signal, television studio, television supper, television system, television theatre, television transmission, television transmitter, television van.

1940 Amateur Radio Handbk. (ed. 2) 306/1 (Index), Television aerials. 1972 J. Porter Meddler & her Murderer xi. 136 Rows of ugly little houses, their roofs buckling under a forest of television aerials.

1947 Electronics May 96/2 (heading) Television antennas for apartments. 1951 W. Faulkner Requiem for Nun iii. 246 Lonely farmhouses glittering and gleaming with automatic stoves and washing machines and television antennae.

1930 Aberdeen Press & Jrnl. 14 Apr. 6, I do not suppose that many Scottish listeners have yet adopted television apparatus.

1932 A. Huxley Brave New World xiv. 234 At the foot of every bed..was a television box.

1950 K. Henney Radio Engin. Handbk. (ed. 4) xix. 1024 Allocation of television channels. Figure 40 shows the allocation of twelve 6-Mc channels for television. 1981 Ann. Reg. 1980 427 Plans for the setting up of the fourth television channel..went ahead.

1966 B.B.C. Handbk. 51 Gaps of the existing BBC radio and television coverage.

1949 Radio Times 15 July 42/1 Your nearest Ultra Television dealer.

1955 Ibid. 22 Apr. 3/1 The present television frequencies..are in the V.H.F. band.

1970 K. Giles Death in Church v. 150 The ladies have arrived... In the television lounge. 1976 W. J. Burley Wycliffe & Schoolgirls ii. 42 The door of the television lounge was open and he could see several patients sitting round the set.

1927 Television receiver [see receiver1 7 c]. 1980 Whitaker's Almanack 1981 816/1 About 3·8 million television receivers are in use [in the Argentine Republic].

1959 ‘O. Mills’ Stairway to Murder viii. 95 The Residents' Lounge and Television Room are both at your disposal. 1971 Country Life 23 Dec. (Suppl.) 3/2 (Advt.), Mansion. Ideally suitable for institutional purposes... 2 television rooms, chapel.

1927 Pictorial Weekly 5 Mar. 100/1 These sets will combine a Television screen and loud-speaker. 1973 D. May Laughter in Djakarta i. 13 Little figures mouthing words that did not reach him, like a television screen with no sound.

1935 Times 1 Feb. 7/4 These first steps being taken towards the establishment of a public television service. 1936 Radio Times 30 Oct. 5/3 Television programmes. The BBC Television Service from Alexandra Palace will be opened by the Postmaster-General on Monday. 1966 B.B.C. Handbk. 15 The Northern Echo [said]..‘some parts of the television service are falling asleep’.

1931 N.Y. Times 31 May ix. 9/2 The Radio Corporation of America..is concentrating its efforts upon the primary technical developments to be completed before undertaking the manufacture and sale of television sets on a commercial basis. 1976 W. Trevor Children of Dynmouth i. 25 Slowly he walked through Dynmouth again, examining the goods in the shop windows, watching golf being played on various television sets.

1927 Bell System Technical Jrnl. VI. 560 (heading) The production and utilization of television signals.

1935 Illustr. London News 23 Feb. 307 (caption) The Baird television studios at the Crystal Palace. 1981 S. Brett Situation Tragedy iv. 43 He wished he knew a bit more about television studios and their sound systems.

1973 D. Miller Chinese Jade Affair xi. 108 This was where the old lady had her television suppers. 1983 Times 1 Oct. 8/6 The art of conversation, of manners, of social interplay..cannot be acquired at the nursery table or when eating a solitary television supper with the baby-minder.

1931 Proc. IRE XXI. 1655 The experimental television system placed in operation by RCA Victor in..1931..was based on the use of a cathode ray tube as the image reproducing element. 1966 B.B.C. Handbk. 35 BBC Television..along with other Western television systems.

Ibid. 33 There are in the London area six..production studios.., a television theatre, two news studios, and two remote control studios.

1929 Radio Times 8 Nov. 412/1, 11.00–11.30 (London only.) Experimental television transmission by the Baird Process.

1928 N.Y. Times 22 Aug. 1/2 Puppets being used because of the limitations of the television transmitter. 1939 Electronics Mar. 26 (heading) Television transmitters.

1956 R. Robinson Landscape with Dead Dons xiii. 117 ‘You refer to the television van?’ ‘The one you told me the little men come in.’

  b. Connected with, participating in, or transmitted as part of organized television broadcasting, as television announcer, television audience, television broadcast, television broadcasting, television commercial, television crew, television critic, television discussion, television drama, television dramatist, television film, television interview, television journalist, television magazine, television news, television personality, television play, television producer, television programme, television public, television pundit, television reporter, television serial, television series, television show, television spot, television star, television version, television viewer.

1938 Radio Times 23 Dec. 36/1 It would be nice to say that the television announcers will hang up their stockings. 1972 J. Mosedale Football xi. 148 Gifford, then a television announcer, talked briefly with the coach.

1937 Discovery Nov. 331/2 Building up a television audience. 1959 Twentieth Cent. Nov. 335 Because of its great size, the television audience now closely resembles the population as a whole.

1928 N.Y. Times 21 Aug. 26 Hourly television broadcasts over WRNY to aid amateurs and experimenters will begin tomorrow. 1935 Times 1 Feb. 8/3 There will be little, if any, scope for television broadcasts unaccompanied by sound.

1928 Daily Mail 3 Aug. 9/5 Mr. J. L. Baird, the inventor of television, stated yesterday that television broadcasting would begin in this country in the autumn. 1977 Rep. Comm. Future of Broadcasting (Cmnd. 6753) ii. 10 All sound and television broadcasting which uses radio waves for transmission is in the charge of two public Authorities, the British Broadcasting Corporation and the Independent Broadcasting Authority.

1957 Television commercial [see commercial n. 2]. 1975 R. Rendell Shake Hands for Ever x. 95 Those children's toys which he had often seen on television commercials.

1964 J. Mitford in Making of Muckraker (1979) 90 Our house..was transformed..by television crews filming interviews about the book. 1978 W. F. Buckley Stained Glass xviii. 172 All Monday the television crews were at work.

1966 B.B.C. Handbk. 13 Television critic Peter Black..asked for a definition of this phrase.

1981 Listener 22 Oct. 465/3 He was the best partner I ever had in television discussions.

1949 Radio Times 15 July 41/2 A variegated week for television drama. 1973 Listener 5 July 27/1 Watergate makes television drama, which rests on an illusion of reality, look pretty thin.

1964 Ibid. 16 Apr. 624/2 ‘Television dramatists’..have the cheek to use television techniques in stage plays.

1951 R. Chandler Let. 5 Jan. (1981) 256, I have seen a number of the television films of your stories. 1967 M. Argyle Psychol. Interpersonal Behaviour x. 189 A television film is played back to the trainee after his performance.

1964 D. Francis Nerve xiv. 192 That was just what I needed... A big race win and a television interview.

1974 Listener 29 Oct. 525/1 A bad, sad month for television journalists.

1955 Radio Times 22 Apr. 15/2 The fortnightly television magazine Ulster Mirror, broadcast since November.

1947 Billboard 1 Nov. 16 Television news borrows from the radio, it is related to the newsreel. 1977 D. L. Altheide in Douglas & Johnson Existential Sociol. iv. 147 Research on television news.

1958 Times Lit. Suppl. 4 Apr. 179/1 The man of letters is no longer a household figure—unless, by coincidence, he is also a television personality. 1978 Times 15 Aug. 13/7 Who does qualify for VIP lounges; presumably some television ‘personalities’ and some entertainers?

1946 B.B.C. Year Book 21 The old hand may in time come to ear-mark his evenings primarily for full-length television plays. 1968 Television play [see preview v. 2 a].

1951 Catal. Exhibits, South Bank Exhib., Festival of Britain 176 Television Producer Malcolm Baker Smith. 1982 Sunday Tel. 3 Jan. 16/4 Television and film producers..go for their inspiration to the printed word.

1930 Billboard 20 Sept. 30/1 Television programs were being broadcast daily from two studios. 1935 Radio Times 27 Dec. 3/1 Television programmes from the new station at the Alexandra Palace start next year. 1981 Ann. Reg. 1980 428 By far the greatest impact made by a single television programme in 1980 resulted from the screening..of ATV's Death of a Princess.

1937 Discovery Nov. 332/2 A television public has not been developed at all.

1981 Listener 22 Oct. 465/3 Robert McKenzie..was the greatest of all television pundits on politics and elections.

1959 Housewife June 32 As a television reporter I've certainly got used to meeting a lot of unhappy people.

1957 M. Summerton Sunset Hour x. 133 He hoped to clinch a contract for a part in a television serial.

1965 B. Glanville Second Home xii. 301 He had to go up to Birmingham next day for some television series he was directing. 1982 Sunday Tel. 3 Jan. 16/7 The most successful television series..are not from books of the very first rank.

1950 R. Chandler Let. 22 Nov. (1981) 241 I'd like to have a television show. 1976 W. Trevor Children of Dynmouth i. 25 He'd asked Timothy what he found interesting outside the Comprehensive and Timothy had said television shows.

1960 Television spot [see spot n.1 8 d].

1951 A. C. Clarke Sands of Mars xiii. 163 A..caricature of a well-known television star.

1982 Sunday Tel. 3 Jan. 16/5 The experience of watching the television version [of Brideshead Revisited] differed very little from that of reading Evelyn Waugh's masterpiece.

1952 Sun (Baltimore) 17 Mar. 1/6 (heading) Television viewers are able to see operation in hospital. 1961 Times 11 Dec. 13/6 Here is a population consisting almost wholly of industrial workers..car owners, television-viewers.

  c. Special Combs. television camera: see camera 3 c; television camera tube, an electron tube of the kind used in television cameras for converting a visual image into an electrical signal; television engineer, one who designs and maintains the mechanical and electrical processes involved in the transmission and reception of television signals; a television repairman; television evangelist orig. U.S. = televangelist; also television evangelism; television image = television picture below; television licence, a licence to use a television set, renewable annually on payment of a fee; television mast, (a) a tall mast, usu. set up on high ground, carrying a television transmitting aerial; (b) = television aerial, sense 3 a above; television network, a system of television broadcasting stations; a television broadcasting organization or channel; television picture, the visual image received on a television screen; television region, a region of the country receiving television broadcasts from a local as well as a national transmitting station; television satellite, a satellite put into orbit round the earth to reflect back television signals; television station, a television broadcasting station (see station n. 13 f); television tube, (a) = picture tube s.v. picture n. 6 d; (b) = television camera tube above.

1940 D. G. Fink Princ. Television Engin. i. 17 (caption) A typical television camera tube, the type 1849 iconoscope, now widely used in television broadcasting. 1974 Encycl. Brit. Macropædia XVIII. 112/1 The image orthicon is the most highly developed of the television camera tubes.

1930 Billboard 20 Sept. 15/2 Equipment to be used will come from General Electric, under the supervision of Dr. E. F. W. Alexanderson, television engineer. 1978 F. King Action x. 31 The failure of the television engineer to call to repair the set.

1977 Washington Post 25 July b1/6 The man his staff calls the ‘Johnny Carson’ of television evangelism..strolls onstage. 1987 Los Angeles Times 31 Mar. i. 20/2 Soon many of the biggest names in television evangelism were sniping or commenting.

1977 Washington Post 30 Apr. a21/2 The fund had had..assets in..race tracks, gambling casinos, nursing homes..and a cathedral for a television evangelist. 1987 Financial Times 9 Oct. 5/1 Mr Pat Robertson, the..former television evangelist, has conceded that he had lied..about the date of his marriage.

1933 Proc. IRE XXI. 1631 (heading) A study of television image characteristics.

1949 Times 17 Feb. 5/3 The first hundred thousand mark is about to be reached in..television licences..compared with the eleven million for sound. 1972 C. Drummond Death at Bar ii. 52 Jarvis..abandoned the cinema the instant he had paid his first television licence fee.

1958 S. Hyland Who goes Hang? i. vii. 39 They could see the enormous, meccano structure of the television mast on top of Sydenham Hill. 1968 M. Allingham Cargo of Eagles iv. 54 They drove..through an area of open planned villas, writhing television masts, mini cars.

1947 Billboard 1 Nov. 16/2 Now that the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) has joined the routes of companies working toward a television network [etc.]. 1974 B.B.C. Handbk. 1975 19/1 One..fairly brief consequence of the energy crisis was the decision to close down all television networks at 10.30 pm.

1937 Chron. & Echo (Northampton) 8 May 6/1 (Advt.), Real television... Demonstration in advance of how Television pictures should appear when broadcast. 1977 J. Fraser Heart's Ease in Death i. 7 The wind shaking the aerial had distorted the television picture.

1974 Television region [see region 5 d].

1960 Aeroplane XCVIII. 419/2 Nowhere will the successful launching of the U.S. television satellite be noted with more interest than in this country. 1976 I. Levin Boys from Brazil vi. 180 Speaking to the whole world at once..by television satellite.

1931 Billboard 1 Aug. 4/1 As soon as television stations increase in number so that they can't be fitted into low channel, high band will be used for them exclusively. 1980 Whitaker's Almanack 1981 816/1 In addition there are 65 television stations, of which 4 are in Buenos Aires.

1943 Electronic Engin. XV. 329/2 The modern television tube has many ancestors. We could start its history in 1897. 1975 D. G. Fink Electronics Engineers' Handbk. xi. 57 Antimony trisulfide vidicons, lead oxide vidicons, and image orthicons are the work-horse television tubes.

Oxford English Dictionary