Choreography

How to spell choreography

12 letters · 5 syllables

How to pronounce choreography

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does choreography mean?

1. nounThe art of designing and arranging the sequence of movements in dance, or the arrangement itself.

Choreography in a sentence

• The choreography for the opening number took weeks to rehearse.

• She studied choreography before joining the touring ballet company.

Where does choreography come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word comes from two Greek elements joined together: khoreia, meaning 'dancing in unison' or 'a dance', which itself derives from khoros, the organised group of singers and dancers in ancient Greek theatre, and graphein, meaning 'to write' or 'to set down'. Put together the parts literally suggest 'the writing down of dance', that is, the notation and arrangement of dance movements. The term was assembled in the early 1700s, borrowed largely through French choreographie, as ballet masters in Europe sought a formal way to record steps on paper. The same khoros root sits inside 'chorus' and 'choir', while the graphein element appears in a huge family of English words such as 'photography' and 'geography'. The chief spelling trap is the opening 'choreo-' with its silent-feeling 'h' and the 'eo' pairing, both of which echo the Greek origin rather than the way the word sounds.

How the word is built

• choreo- (from Greek khoreia: dance)
• -graphy (from graphein: to write or set down)