cancel
See also: Cancel
English
Alternative forms
- cancell (obsolete)
Etymology
From Middle English cancellen, from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Anglo-Norman canceler (“to cross out with lines”), from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Latin cancellare (“to make resemble a lattice”), from cancelli (“a railing or lattice”), diminutive of cancer (“a lattice”).
Pronunciation
Verb
cancel (third-person singular simple present cancels, present participle cancelling or (US) canceling, simple past and past participle cancelled or (US) canceled)
- (transitive) To cross out something with lines etc.
- (Can we date this quote by Blackstone and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- A deed may be avoided by delivering it up to be cancelled; that is, to have lines drawn over it in the form of latticework or cancelli; the phrase is now used figuratively for any manner of obliterating or defacing it.
- (Can we date this quote by Blackstone and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- (transitive) To invalidate or annul something.
- He cancelled his order on their website.
- 1914, Marjorie Benton Cooke, Bambi
- "I don't know what your agreement was, Herr Professor, but if it had money in it, cancel it. I want him to learn that lesson, too."
- (transitive) To mark something (such as a used postage stamp) so that it can't be reused.
- This machine cancels the letters that have a valid zip code.
- (transitive) To offset or equalize something.
- The corrective feedback mechanism cancels out the noise.
- (transitive, mathematics) To remove a common factor from both the numerator and denominator of a fraction, or from both sides of an equation.
- (transitive, media) To stop production of a programme.
- (printing, dated) To suppress or omit; to strike out, as matter in type.
- (obsolete) To shut out, as with a railing or with latticework; to exclude.
- (Can we date this quote by John Milton and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- cancelled from heaven
- (Can we date this quote by John Milton and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- (slang) To kill.
- (transitive, neologism) To cease to provide financial or moral support to people deemed unacceptable. (This is a hot sense, kept provisionally)
- 2018, Jonah Engel Bromwich, in The New York Times [1]
- Bill Gates is canceled. Gwen Stefani and Erykah Badu are canceled. Despite his relatively strong play in the World Cup, Cristiano Ronaldo has been canceled. Taylor Swift is canceled and Common is canceled and, Wednesday, Antoni Porowski, a “Queer Eye” fan favorite was also canceled. Needless to say, Kanye West is canceled, too.
- 2019, Christopher Hooton, in VICE [2]
- We Spoke to Joan Cornellá, the Artist Who Really Should Have Been Cancelled By Now
- 2018, Jonah Engel Bromwich, in The New York Times [1]
Synonyms
Derived terms
Descendants
- → Gulf Arabic: كنسل (kansal)
Translations
cross out
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invalidate, annul
|
mark to prevent reuse
|
offset, equalize
|
remove a common factor
|
stop production
|
printing, dated: suppress or omit
slang: kill
- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked
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Noun
cancel (plural cancels)
- A cancellation (US); (nonstandard in some kinds of English).
- (obsolete) An enclosure; a boundary; a limit.
- (Can we date this quote by Jeremy Taylor and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- A prison is but a retirement, and opportunity of serious thoughts, to a person whose spirit […] desires no enlargement beyond the cancels of the body.
- (Can we date this quote by Jeremy Taylor and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- (printing) The suppression on striking out of matter in type, or of a printed page or pages.
- (printing) The page thus suppressed.
- (printing) The page that replaces it.
Derived terms
Translations
cancellation
|
printing: suppression on striking out of matter
Related terms
Further reading
- “cancel”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- “cancel”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
- “cancel”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
Spanish
Noun
cancel m (plural canceles)
Categories:
- English terms inherited from Middle English
- English terms derived from Middle English
- English terms derived from Anglo-Norman
- English terms derived from Latin
- English 1-syllable words
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- English lemmas
- English verbs
- English transitive verbs
- Requests for date/Blackstone
- en:Mathematics
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