Expressing

How to spell expressing

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce expressing

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does expressing mean?

1. verbConveying a thought, feeling, or idea in words, looks, or actions.

Expressing in a sentence

• She spent the meeting expressing her concerns about the budget.

• The card was a simple way of expressing his thanks to the team.

Where does expressing come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This is the present participle of the verb 'express', which traces back to the Latin exprimere, meaning literally 'to press out'. That verb was built from ex-, meaning 'out', and premere, meaning 'to press', so the original image was of squeezing something out, whether juice from a fruit or a shape from a mould. The sense widened through Late Latin and Old French to cover pressing a meaning or feeling 'out' into words, and English adopted it in the 1400s. The same premere root sits inside everyday relatives like 'pressure', 'compress', and 'impress', which all share the idea of pressing. The double 's' in the middle, kept from the Latin pressare, is the spot writers most often misjudge.

How the word is built

• ex- (out)
• press (from Latin pressare: to press)
• -ing (present participle suffix)