realize

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See also: realizē

English[edit]

Alternative forms[edit]

  • realise (non-Oxford British spelling)

Etymology[edit]

Attested since 1610, from French réaliser, from Middle French real (“actual”), from Old French reel, from Latin reālis, from rēs (“thing, event, deed, fact”); as if real +‎ -ize.

Pronunciation[edit]

Verb[edit]

realize (third-person singular simple present realizes, present participle realizing, simple past and past participle realized)

  2. (slightly formal, transitive) To make real; to convert from the imaginary or fictitious into reality; to bring into real existence
    Synonyms: accomplish, actualize, materialize
    Coordinate term: reify
    • 1665, Joseph Glanvill, Scepsis Scientifica:
      We realize what Archimedes had only in hypothesis, weighting a single grain against the globe of earth.
    The objectives of the project were never fully realized.
  3. (transitive) To become aware of (a fact or situation, especially of something that has been true for a long time).
    He realized that he had left his umbrella on the train.
    The defendant desperately yelled at her young daughter, frantic to make her realize what she had done.
  4. (transitive) To cause to seem real to other people.
    • 1881, Benjamin Jowett, Thucydides Translated into English:
      Many coincidences […] soon begin to appear in them [Greek inscriptions] which realize ancient history to us.
  5. (transitive) To sense vividly or strongly; to make one's own in thought or experience.
    • 1859, Ferna Vale, Natalie; or, A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds:
      Over the mind of the tourist, visiting the Old World for the first time,—countries where have transpired thrilling events recorded in history, what an immensity of thought and feeling sweeps! It was thus with Natalie; she could not realize that she was treading in the footsteps of royalty, who living in long past days, had held sway over this land, had looked upon this land of "merrie England" as their home.
    • 1887, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet, section II:
      That any civilized human being in this nineteenth century should not be aware that the earth travelled round the sun appeared to be to me such an extraordinary fact that I could hardly realize it.
    • 1996, Alan Brown, Audrey Hepburn's Neck:
      Drawings appear fully realized in his mind's eye at a furious rate, before he even picks up his pencil.
  6. (transitive, business) To acquire as an actual possession; to obtain as the result of plans and efforts; to gain; to get
    to realize large profits from a speculation
  7. (transitive, business, finance) To convert any kind of property into money, especially property representing investments, such as shares, bonds, etc.
    Profits from the investment can be realized at any time by selling the shares.
    By realizing the company's assets, the liquidator was able to return most of the shareholders’ investments.
    • 1855, Washington Irving, “[A Time of Unexampled Prosperity.] The Great Mississippi Bubble.”, in Wolfert’s Roost and Other Papers, […], New York, N.Y.: G[eorge] P[almer] Putnam & Co., […], →OCLC, page 174:
      Wary men took the alarm, and began to realize, a word now first brought into use to express the conversion of ideal property into something real.
  8. (transitive, business, obsolete) To convert into real property; to make real estate of.
  9. (transitive, linguistics) To turn an abstract linguistic object into actual language, especially said of a phoneme's conversion into speech sound.
    The southern /v/ is realized as the voiced approximant [ʋ].
    • 2016, Martin Maiden, The Oxford Guide to the Romance Languages, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 297:
      Many (probably most) speakers realize it as [ø] or [œ] in other contexts as well. In Midi French, schwa is realized more frequently than in northern varieties, including in word-final position, where it generally (but not always) corresponds to […]

Conjugation[edit]

Conjugation of realize
infinitive (to) realize
present tense past tense
1st-person singular realize realized
2nd-person singular realize, realizest† realized, realizedst†
3rd-person singular realizes, realizeth† realized
plural realize
subjunctive realize realized
imperative realize —
participles realizing realized

†Archaic or obsolete.

Derived terms[edit]

Related terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

References[edit]

Mauritian Creole[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From French réaliser.

Pronunciation[edit]

Verb[edit]

realize (medial form realiz)

  1. to realize.

Related terms[edit]

Portuguese[edit]

Verb[edit]

realize

  1. inflection of realizar:
    1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
    2. third-person singular imperative
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