supervisor

English

Alternative forms

• supervisour (obsolete)

Etymology

Attested since the 15th century C.E.; from Middle English supervisor, supervisour, supervysor, supervysour, from Latin supervīsor, from supervideō, in turn from super + videō.

Pronunciation

• enPR: so͞op′ərvīz'ər, IPA^(key): /ˈsuːpɚˌvaɪzɚ/

Noun

supervisor (plural supervisors)

1. (management) A person with the official task of overseeing the work of a person or group, or of other operations and activities.
2. A person who monitors someone to make sure they comply with rules or other requirements set for them.
3. (US) In certain states, an elected member of the governing body for a county which is called the board of supervisors.
4. (computing) A process responsible for managing other processes.
   • 1965, P. A. Crisman, The compatible time-sharing system: a programmer's guide (page 14)

     The clock burst which enables the supervisor to housekeep the console input and output and to change program status is currently set to 200 ms.

Related terms

• supervise
• supervision
• supervisory

Translations

a person with the official task of overseeing the work of a person or group etc.

• Arabic: مُشْرِف m (mušrif)
• Bulgarian: ръководител (bg) m (rǎkovoditel), надзорник (bg) (nadzornik)
• Catalan: supervisor m
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 監督者／监督者 (zh), 监督者 (zh) (jiāndūzhě), 管理者 (zh) (guǎnlǐzhě), 主管 (zh) (zhǔguǎn)

• Czech: dozorce (cs) m, inspektor (cs) m, dohližitel m
• Dutch: toezichthouder (nl) m, leidinggevende (nl)
• Finnish: esimies (fi)
• French: superviseur (fr) m
• Galician: supervisor (gl) m
• Georgian: უფროსი (uprosi), ხელმძღვანელი (xelmʒɣvaneli), მენეჯერი (meneǯeri), ზედამხედველი (zedamxedveli), ინსპექტორი (insṗekṭori), კონტროლერი (ḳonṭroleri)
• German: Aufseher (de), Vorgesetzter (de) m
• Greek: επόπτης (el) m (epóptis)

  Ancient: ἐπόπτης m (epóptēs), ἐπίσκοπος m (epískopos)

• Hungarian: munkafelügyelő (hu)
• Irish: maor m
• Italian: supervisore m
• Japanese: 主管 (ja) (しゅかん, shukan), スーパーバイザー (sūpābaizā), 監督 (ja), 監察 (ja), 管理者 (ja), 管理人
• Khmer: មេការ (mee kaa)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Kurdish:

  Central Kurdish: چاودێر (ckb) (çawdêr)

• Middle English: surveyour
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: oppsynsmann m

  Nynorsk: oppsynsmann m

• Plautdietsch: Äwasechta m
• Polish: naczelnik (pl) m, nadzorca (pl) m
• Portuguese: supervisor (pt) m
• Russian: нача́льник (ru) m (načálʹnik), руководи́тель (ru) m (rukovodítelʹ), (negative connotation) надсмо́трщик (ru) m (nadsmótrščik), (negative connotation) надзира́тель (ru) m (nadzirátelʹ), (manufacturing, construction) ма́стер (ru) m (máster), суперва́йзер (ru) m (supervájzɛr)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: супервизор m, надзорник m, надгледник m, надређени m, претпостављени m

  Roman: supervizor (sh) m, nadzornik (sh) m, nadglednik (sh) m, nadređeni (sh) m, pretpostavljeni (sh) m

• Spanish: supervisor (es) m, director (es) m
• Swedish: handledare (sv) c, förman (sv) c
• Tagalog: tagamasid
• Yiddish: אויגהאַלטער m (oyghalter)

See also

• manager
• on-call supervisor
• superintendent

References

• Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “supervisor”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

Anagrams

• proviruses

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Catalan

Noun

supervisor m (plural supervisors, feminine supervisora)

1. supervisor

Related terms

• supervisar
• supervisió

Further reading

• “supervisor” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “supervisor”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2024
• “supervisor” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.

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Portuguese

Etymology

super- +‎ visor

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /supɛɾviˈzoɾ/

Noun

supervisor m (plural supervisores)

1. (management) supervisor

See also

• gerente
• administrador
• capataz
• chefe
• controlador
• feitor
• organizador
• superintendente

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Spanish

Noun

supervisor m (plural supervisores, feminine supervisora, feminine plural supervisoras)

1. supervisor
2. handler (e.g, a secret agent's handler)

Related terms

• supervisar
• supervisión

Further reading

• “supervisor”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014