Alternating

How to spell alternating

11 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce alternating

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does alternating mean?

1. adjectiveOccurring or arranged by turns, one following the other in a repeating sequence.
2. verbSwitching repeatedly between two states, tasks, or positions.

Alternating in a sentence

• adjective

  The hallway floor had an alternating pattern of black and white tiles.

• verb

  She spent the week alternating between the head office and the warehouse.

• adjective

  The report listed sales in alternating rows of red and green for clarity.

• verb

  The pump works by alternating the pressure on each side of the valve.

Where does alternating come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb alternare, meaning 'to do one thing and then another by turns', which was built on the adjective alternus, 'every other' or 'one after the other'. That adjective in turn grew out of alter, the Latin word for 'the other of two', the same root that gives us 'alter', 'alternative' and 'altercation'. English adopted 'alternate' in the sixteenth century, first as an adjective and soon as a verb, with 'alternating' arising as its participle form. The sense has stayed remarkably close to the original idea of taking turns: things that alternate simply follow each other in regular succession. The single letter that trips writers is the unstressed vowel in the middle, where 'altern-' can be mistaken for 'altar-' or 'alter-', even though the spelling keeps a clean 'alter' followed by 'nating'.

How the word is built

• altern- (from Latin alternus: by turns, every other)
• -ate (verb-forming)
• -ing (present participle/adjective ending)