communication
(kəmjuːnɪˈkeɪʃən)
Also 4–5 co(m)mynycacion, -oun, 5 (kom-), 6 commyni-, comunication, etc.
[a. OF. co(m)municacion, ad. L. commūnicātiōn-em, n. of action f. commūnicāre to communicate.]
1. The action of communicating or imparting. Now rare of things material, exc. as the vehicles of information: e.g. of a letter, a paper to a society, an article to a magazine, etc.
| 1382 Wyclif 2 Cor. ix. 13 Glorifiynge God..in symplenesse of comynycacioun into hem and into alle. 1533 More Debell. Salem Wks. 960/1 The lewde communicacyon of heresies. 1623 Bingham Xenophon 69 So was there amongst them a mutuall communication of their commodities. 1704 Nelson Fest. & Fasts xxi. (1739) 254 This Communication of the Holy Ghost to the Apostles. 1806 Med. Jrnl. XV. 235 An apparent but not real communication of the disease. 1862 Ruskin Munera P. (1880) 102 The mercantile [power], presiding over circulation and communication of things. Mod. The communication of motion to a piece of mechanism, of heat to the body, etc. |
2. spec. The imparting, conveying, or exchange of ideas, knowledge, information, etc. (whether by speech, writing, or signs). Hence (often
pl.), the science or process of conveying information,
esp. by means of electronic or mechanical techniques. Freq.
attrib. (see sense 12).
| 1690 Locke Hum. Und. iii. ix. (1695) 269 To make Words serviceable to the end of Communication. 1806–31 A. Knox Rem. (1844) I. 68 Times of severe trial have been chosen for Divine communications. 1848 Macaulay Hist. Eng. II. 80 He had been..in close communication with the French embassy on this subject. 1872 Ruskin Eagle's Nest §33 The reward which rapidity of communication now ensures to discoveries that are profitable. 1946 [see communication theory]. 1955 C. Cherry in Stud. Communication 48 The so-called Theory of Communication is a rigid scientific theory... It was originally set up for the purpose of defining the ‘commodity’ which tele-communication engineers sell with their telegraph and telephone systems. 1959 Listener 21 May 885/1 The background and history of the ideas now current in communications. Ibid., A communications culture. |
3. concr. That which is communicated, or in which facts are communicated; a piece of information; a written paper containing observations.
| 1490 Caxton Eneydos Prol. 3 Euery man..wyll vtter his commynycacyon and maters in suche..termes that fewe men shall vnderstonde theym. 1526 Tindale Eph. iv. 29 Let no filthy communicacion procede out of youre mouthes. 1611 Bible 2 Kings ix. 11 Yee know the man, and his communication. 1791 Boswell Johnson Advt., Those who have been pleased to favour me with Communications. 1848 Macaulay Hist. Eng. II. 172 Mingled with his communications on such subjects are other communications of a very different..kind. Mod. The Royal Society has agreed to print this communication. I have read your communication to the Academy. It was pleaded that the communication was privileged. |
† 4. Interchange of speech, conversation, conference.
Obs.| 1462 Paston Lett. No. 452 II. 102 Thomas Edmonds fell in communicacion with old Debnam. 1491 Act 7 Hen. VII, c. 6 The king..hath had..many assembles and commynycacions with the King of Scottes for amyte, trewes and peas to be had. 1526 Pigr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 76 b, She..had communycacyon with the serpent. 1582 N.T. (Rhem.) 1 Cor. xv. 23 Euil communications corrupt good manners [so 1611; Gr. ὁµιλίαι, Vulg. colloquia, Wyclif yuel spechis, Tindale malicious speakinges, Cranmer euel wordes, Genev. euel speakinges; Revised 1881 has ‘evil company’; the American Revisers prefer ‘evil companionships’; see 5]. 1605 Camden Rem. (1637) 283 In communication when mention hapned to be made of a certaine Bishop. |
5. a. Converse, personal intercourse.
| 1580 Baret Alv. B 628 Intercourse of marchandise..communication for bying and selling. 1667 Milton P.L. vii. 1066 Thou..Best with thy self accompanied, seek'st not Social communication. 1725 De Foe Voy. round W. (1840) 152 They had little knowledge or communication one with another. |
† b. Sexual intercourse.
Obs.| 1771 Smollett Humph. Cl. (1793) I. 18, I have had communication with her three times. 1792 Burke Sk. Negro Code Wks. IX. 300 Any European Officer..having unlawful communication with any woman Slave. |
6. a. Access or means of access between two or more persons or places; the action or faculty of passing from one place to another; passage (between two places, vessels, or spaces).
| 1684 Scanderbeg Rediv. vi. 151 The Turks had there a Considerable Garrison, which might Incommode the Communication between his Troops, and the Imperialists. 1769 Robertson Chas. V, V. 1. 66 Even between distant parts of the same kingdom the communication was rare and difficult. 1871 B. Stewart Heat §116 Two vessels at different temperature in communication with each other. 1880 M{supc}Carthy Own Times III. xxxiv. 197 They had admirable means of communication by land and sea. |
b. concr. A means of communicating; a channel, line of connexion, connecting passage or opening. Hence
door of communication.
| 1715 Desaguliers Fires Impr. 118 There must be a communication with the passage..whence the External Air comes immediately in. 1796 Morse Amer. Geog. I. 166 This lake is the communication between the Lakes Winnepeek and Bourbon, and Lake Superior. 1847 E. Brontë Wuthering Heights I. viii. 157, I..walked off to the kitchen..leaving the door of communication open. 1864 Spectator 31 Dec. 1478 Lee's communications through South-Western Virginia..have been cut by General Stoneman. 1868 W. Collins Moonstone III. 282 It was the next room to yours; and the two had a door of communication between them. 1879 Lubbock Addr. Pol. & Educ. i. 5 To protect our communications with India and Australia. |
c. line of communication: see
line n.2 26 a;
spec. = communication line (see sense 12); (see also
quot. 1802); also
line(s) of communication(s).
| a 1666 Evelyn Diary 7 Dec. an. 1642 (1955) II. 80, I went from Wotton to Lond[on], to see the so much celebrated line of Communication. 1694 Child Disc. Trade (ed. 4) 96 The City of London and Westminster, Borough of Southwark, and all other places within the usual lines of communication. 1802 C. James Mil. Dict., Lines of communication, are trenches that unite one work to another..: thence the whole intrenchment round any place is sometimes called a line of communication, because it leads to all the works. 1888 Encycl. Brit. XXIV. 346/1 A system..by which along a regular chain of posts, or ‘line of communications’, an army received its supplies of food, [etc.]. 1899 Westm. Gaz. 16 Nov. 5/2 Inspector-General of Lines of Communication. 1900 Conan Doyle Great Boer War 201 One dashing raid carried out by a detachment from Methuen's line of communications. 1925 Mottram Sixty-Four, Ninety-Four! 228 Some lines-of-communication Head-quarters. 1959 Listener 12 Nov. 820/1 Duchamp's activity, progressively destroying all the old lines of communication. |
† 7. Common participation.
Obs.| 1602 T. Fitzherbert Apol. 55 a, The cup, sayth he, which wee blesse, is it not a communication of the blood of our Lord? 1658 J. Rowland Moufet's Theat. Ins. 929 Authors describe it [hornet] to be in colour like a Wasp.. and in communication of labour like all other social winged Insects. 1765–9 Blackstone Comm. in Stephen Laws Eng. (1845) I. 84 Admitting them [the Welsh] to a thorough communication of laws with the subjects of England. 1771 Goldsm. Hist. Eng. IV. 128 That all the subjects of Great Britain should enjoy a communication of privileges and advantages. |
† 8. Congruity, affinity, quality in common.
rare.
| 1654 tr. Scudery's Curia Polit. 186 The coldness of the Climate hath some communication with their Nature. |
† 9. The Holy Communion; its observance.
rare.
| c 1610 Women Saints 131 If the communication of our Lords bodie was there celebrated. 1672 Cave Prim. Chr. iii. v. (1673) 376 We admit them in the Church to a right of Communication to drink of the Cup of the Bloud of Christ. |
10. Rhet. (See
quots.)
| 1553 T. Wilson Rhet. 99 b, Communicacion is then used when we debate with other, and aske questions as though we loked for an answer. 1793 Beattie Moral Sc. §865 (L.) Communication..takes place when a speaker or writer assumes his hearer or reader as a partner in his sentiments and discourse, saying We, instead of I or Ye. |
11. Freemasonry. The name of the quarterly and half-yearly conferences or assemblies of the fraternity. (Used in the first Book of Constitutions, 1723.)
| 1883 Manch. Exam. 22 Nov. 5/4 The Prince of Wales will be again nominated for the office of Grand Master of English Freemasons, at the quarterly communication of Grand Lodge on the 5th of December. 1888 Constit. Free & Accepted Masons Rule 11. 21 Four Grand Lodges shall be holden in London, for quarterly communication in each year. |
12. Comb., as
communication(s) behaviour,
communication engineer,
communication engineering,
communication equipment,
communication plane,
communication problem,
communication research,
communication science;
communication-cord, a cord by which passengers in a railway train may communicate with the guard or driver;
communication line, a line by which a field army maintains communication with its base and along which all reinforcements and supplies are sent;
communication-plate, a perforated portion of the wall between adjoining cells of a polyzoan colony;
communication(s) satellite, an artificial earth-satellite used for radio or television communications;
communication theory, the study and statement of the principles and methods by which information is conveyed,
e.g. in language;
communication trench Mil., a trench forming a means of communication between two different positions;
communication-valves, the valves in a steam-pipe which connects two boilers to an engine, for cutting off communication between either boiler and the engine (Weale
Dict. Terms, 1850).
| 1949 R. K. Merton in Lazarsfeld & Stanton Communications Research 180 (heading) A study of interpersonal influence and of communications behavior in a local community. |
| 1901 G. E. T. Edalji Railway Law Index 118 Communication Cord, using, 105. 1936 E. Ambler Dark Frontier vi. 98 The train ground to a standstill. Obviously, someone had pulled the communication cord. |
| 1950 Sci. Amer. May 42 Communication engineers call this system ‘pulse-frequency modulation’. 1956 A. Huxley Adonis & Alphabet 78 Physicists, chemists, metallurgists, communication engineers and mechanics. 1964 R. H. Robins Gen. Linguistics 11 The communications engineer is helped by some knowledge of the basic composition of the language signals. |
| 1920 Harvard Univ. Official Reg., Descr. Catal. 1920–21 356 (title) Special problems in communication engineering. 1934 Webster, Communication engineering, a branch of engineering concerned with methods of communication by electrical instruments, telephone, telegraph, radio, cable, etc. 1942 Electron. Engin. XV. 252 Practically all sources of electrical energy used in radio or communication engineering have appreciable internal resistance. |
| 1962 A. Nisbett Technique Sound Studio 246 A variety of communications equipment. |
| 1898 Daily News 17 Jan. 7/3 With 750 miles of communication lines to protect. 1940 N. Monks Squadrons Up! i. 13 A two-seater Magister communications plane. |
| 1889 Nicholson & Lydekker Palæont. 607 Contiguous cells are commonly placed in direct communication with one another by what have been called ‘communication-plates’ or ‘rosette-plates’. These are portions of the cell-wall pierced by one or more minute pores. |
| 1948 W. Weaver in Shannon & Weaver Math. Theory Communication 95 (heading) Three levels of communications problems. |
| 1949 R. K. Merton Social Theory & Struct. iii. 215 The ‘European’ variant of communications research—namely, the sociology of knowledge—and the ‘American’ variant—namely, the sociology of opinion and mass communications—may provide a setting. |
| 1961 New Statesman 20 Jan. 80/2 The proposals for communications satellites for relaying telephone conversations (and television) around the world. 1962 New Scientist 28 June 717/3 Communications satellites have an important part to play in the Cold War. 1964 Discovery Oct. 48/3 Communication-satellite systems will almost certainly make use of satellites in circular orbit. |
| 1957 C. Cherry Human Communication ii. 30 (heading) Evolution of communication science. |
| 1946 D. Gabor in Jrnl. Inst. Electr. Engin. XCIII. iii. 429 Theory of communication... Hitherto communicaton theory was based on two alternative methods of signal analysis. 1948 N. Wiener Cybernetics 19 We have decided to call the entire field of control and communication theory, whether in the machine or in the animal, by the name of Cybernetics. 1949 Bell System Techn. Jrnl. XXVIII. 656 (title) Communication theory of secrecy systems. 1953 W. Jackson Communication Theory p. x, From the mathematical point of view modern communication theory is the application of probability theory to communication problems. |
| 1914 Illustr. London News 24 Oct. 571 At all points subject to shell-fire access to the firing-line from behind is provided by communication-trenches. 1914 Times 10 Dec. 6/1 Leading away from the firing line are what we call communication trenches, up which come our rations from the rear. 1925 Mottram Sixty-Four, Ninety-Four! 101 The two bays by the crump-hole at the mouth of the communication trench were always empty. |
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communication skills n. abilities that enable one to communicate effectively with other people,
esp. considered as a qualification or asset; (sometimes)
spec. an aptitude for conveying information and ideas combined with good listening and comprehension skills.
| 1935 Eng. Jrnl. 24 111 The English teacher who seeks to improve the *communication skills of his students. 1967 Jrnl. School Psychol. 5 107 A practicum in communication skills..might well prove worthy of addition to the preparation of school psychologists. 1990 P. Taylor See how they Run iv. 88 They were media-age candidates who believed their path to the Oval Office lay in communication skills and personal attractiveness, not in party support or institutional backing or ideological purity. 2001 Community Care 13 Dec. 58/1 (advt.) Applications are invited from individuals who are prepared to develop workbased and e.learning. You must have effective communication skills to work with colleagues, students and practitioners at a distance. |