Nominated

How to spell nominated

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce nominated

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does nominated mean?

1. verbProposed or formally put forward someone for a position, award, or honour.

Nominated in a sentence

• The committee nominated her for the leadership role.

• The film was nominated for three major awards this year.

Where does nominated come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word goes back to the Latin verb nominare, which meant 'to name' or 'to call by name', and that verb was built directly on the noun nomen, the ordinary Latin word for 'name'. From the basic idea of naming someone, the sense developed into the more formal act of putting a person's name forward for an office, an honour, or a duty. English took the verb 'nominate' into use during the late 1500s, drawing on the Latin past participle nominatus, and 'nominated' is simply its regular past tense and participle. The very same nomen root sits inside familiar relatives such as 'noun', 'nominal', and 'denomination', all circling the idea of naming. The spelling trap is the quiet single n in the middle and the unstressed schwa vowel in 'nom-i-nat-ed', which tempts writers to drop or swap letters.

How the word is built

• nomin- (from Latin nomen: name)
• -ate (verb suffix)
• -ed (past tense/participle)