different between instruct vs pronounce

English

Etymology

From Latin ?nstr?ctus, perfect passive participle of ?nstru? (“I instruct; I arrange, furnish, or provide”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??n?st??kt/
• Rhymes: -?kt

Verb

instruct (third-person singular simple present instructs, present participle instructing, simple past and past participle instructed)

1. (transitive) To teach by giving instructions.

   Synonyms: educate, guide

   • c. 1604, William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure, Act I, Scene 3,^[1]

     Supply me with the habit and instruct me

     How I may formally in person bear me

     Like a true friar.

   • 1682, Aphra Behn, The False Count, London: Jacob Tonson, Act III, Scene 2, p. 33,^[2]

     What a dishonour’s this, to me, to have so Dull a Father, that needs to be instructed in his Duty.

   • 1751, Samuel Johnson, The Rambler, No. 156, 14 September, 1751, in Volume 5, London: J. Payne and J. Bouquet, 1752, p. 177,^[3]

     […] the design of tragedy is to instruct by moving the passions,

   • 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter, Chapter 10,^[4]

     […] I should deem you a man sore sick, it may be, yet not so sick but that an instructed and watchful physician might well hope to cure you.

   • 1974, Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, New York: William Morrow, Part 4, Chapter 29, p. 353,^[5]

     At the Laundromat I instruct Chris on how to operate the drier, start the washing machines […]

2. (transitive) To tell (someone) what they must or should do.

   Synonyms: command, direct, order

   Usage note: "instruct" is less forceful than "order", but weightier than "advise"

   • c. 1591, William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 1, Act III, Scene 1,^[6]

     What, shall a child instruct you what to do?

   • 1848, William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair, Chapter 39,^[7]

     All the servants were instructed to address her as “Mum,” or “Madam” […]

   • 1989, John Irving, A Prayer for Owen Meany, New York: Ballantine, 1997, Chapter 5, p. 195,^[8]

     Observing that the Christ Child’s nose was running, she deftly wiped it; then she held the handkerchief in place, while instructing him to “blow.”

Related terms

Translations

Noun

instruct (plural instructs)

1. (obsolete) Instruction.

Adjective

instruct (not comparable)

1. (obsolete) Arranged; furnished; provided.
   • c. 1615, George Chapman (translator), Homer’s Odysses, London: Nathaniell Butter, Book 4, p. 62,^[9]

     For he had neither ship, instruct with oares,

     Nor men to fetch him from those stranger shores.

2. (obsolete) Instructed; taught; enlightened.
   • 1671, John Milton, Paradise Regained, London: John Starkey, Book 1, lines 438-441, p. 24,^[10]

     Who ever by consulting at thy shrine

     Return’d the wiser, or the more instruct

     To flye or follow what concern’d him most,

     And run not sooner to his fatal snare?

Anagrams

• unstrict

English

Etymology

Recorded since c.1330 as Middle English pronouncen (“to utter, declare officially”), from Old French prononcier, from Latin pr?n?nti?, itself from pr?- (“forth, out, in public”) + n?nti? (“I announce”) from n?ntius (“messenger”).

Pronunciation

• (General American, Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /p???na?ns/
• Rhymes: -a?ns

Verb

pronounce (third-person singular simple present pronounces, present participle pronouncing, simple past and past participle pronounced)

1. (transitive) To declare formally, officially or ceremoniously.

2. (transitive) To declare authoritatively, or as a formal expert opinion.
   1. (transitive) To pronounce dead.
      • 2015, April 30, Carol H. Allan, David R. Fowler (medical examiners), Freddie Gray autopsy: excerpt from the report, published in The Baltimore Sun, June 24, 2015

        Despite resuscitative efforts, Mr. Gray was pronounced on 4/19/2015.

3. (intransitive) To pass judgment.

4. (transitive) To sound out (a word or phrase); to articulate.
   • 1869, Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad, page 182:

     They spell it "Vinci" and pronounce it "Vinchy". Foreigners always spell better than they pronounce.
   1. (in passive) To sound like.

5. (intransitive) To produce the components of speech.

6. (transitive) To read aloud.

Derived terms

Related terms

• pronouncement
• pronunciation

Translations

Anagrams

• couponner