détente

See also: detente and detenté

English

Alternative forms

• detente

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from French détente (“relaxing”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /deɪˈtɒnt/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (US) IPA^(key): /deɪˈtɑnt/, /dɪˈtɑnt/
• Rhymes: -ɒnt

Noun

détente (plural détentes)

1. (chiefly politics) A relaxing of tension, especially between countries.
   • 2012, Christopher Clark, The Sleepwalkers, Penguin, published 2013, page 318:

     Analogous structural and political constraints stood in the way of a lasting détente between Germany and Britain.

   • 2014 January 14, Stephen Kinzer, “Invading Iraq was dumb enough. Now Congress wants to derail the Iran deal”, in The Guardian‎^[1]:

     No step the United States could take anywhere in the world would bring strategic benefits as great as detente with Iran.

Antonyms

• rollback/regime change
• containment

Related terms

• detent

Translations

a relaxing of tension, especially between countries

• Belarusian: разра́дка f (razrádka)
• Bulgarian: разведря́ване n (razvedrjávane)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 緩和政策／缓和政策 (huǎnhé zhèngcè), 緩和政策／缓和政策 (huǎnhé zhèngcè)

• Danish: detente c, afspændingspolitik c
• Dutch: detente (nl) f
• Finnish: liennytys (fi)
• French: détente (fr) f
• German: Entspannungspolitik (de) f
• Hebrew: דֶּטַנְט \ דטאנט (he) m (detánt)
• Japanese: デタント (detanto)
• Korean: 데탕트 (detangteu)
• Malay: detente
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: avspenningspolitikk m

• Persian: دتانت (detânt)
• Polish: détente (pl) n
• Russian: разря́дка (ru) f (razrjádka)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: дѐтант m

  Roman: dètant (sh) m

• Spanish: detente (es) m
• Swedish: avspänning (sv) c, détente (sv) c, avspänningspolitik c
• Turkish: detant (tr), yumuşama (tr)
• Ukrainian: розря́дка f (rozrjádka)

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin detenta or detendita, as a feminine past participle of detentus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /de.tɑ̃t/

• Audio:

  (file)

Noun

détente f (plural détentes)

1. relaxation, détente
2. trigger (firearms)
3. (sports) height to which one is able to jump
4. (physics) expansion of a gas or a spring

Derived terms

• long à la détente
• presser la détente

Related terms

• détendre

Descendants

• → English: détente, → detent

Further reading

• “détente”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Anagrams

• endette, endetté