Redress

How to spell redress

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce redress

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does redress mean?

1. verbTo put right, remedy, or set straight a wrong or unfair situation.
2. nounCompensation or remedy for a wrong, grievance, or loss.

Redress in a sentence

• verb

  The new policy aims to redress years of unequal pay.

• noun

  The workers sought legal redress for unfair dismissal.

• verb

  The company promised to redress the faults found in its safety report.

• noun

  Customers have little redress when a warranty quietly expires.

Where does redress come from?

Language of origin: French

This word arrived in English in the late 1300s from the Old French redresser, which meant to set upright again or to straighten out. That verb was built from the prefix re-, carrying the sense of back or again, joined to dresser, meaning to arrange, prepare, or make straight, itself drawn from the Latin directus, meaning straightened or guided. The everyday word dress shares exactly this ancestry, since both come from the idea of putting something into proper order; clothing is simply what you arrange on the body. Over time the literal sense of physically straightening faded in English, and redress settled into its modern meaning of putting a wrong situation right or providing compensation for an injustice. The hidden -d-d- where re- meets dress is the small spelling trap, and remembering the link to dress keeps it intact.

How the word is built

• re- (again, back)
• dress (from Old French dresser: to set straight, arrange)