Reversal

How to spell reversal

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce reversal

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does reversal mean?

1. nounA change to an opposite direction, position, decision, or state of affairs.

Reversal in a sentence

• The sudden reversal of company policy confused the whole sales team.

• A reversal in the housing market wiped out months of paper gains.

Where does reversal come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This noun grows out of the verb 'reverse', which English took from Old French 'reverser' in the 1300s. The deep root is the Latin verb 'revertere', built from 're-' meaning 'back' and 'vertere' meaning 'to turn', so the literal idea is 'to turn back' or 'turn around'. The same 'vertere' root quietly powers a whole family of English words, including 'convert', 'divert', 'invert' and even 'versus', all of which involve some kind of turning. The '-al' ending was added later, on the English side, to turn the verb into the abstract noun naming the act of turning something the opposite way, whether that is a direction, a decision, or a state of affairs. A helpful spelling note is that the ending is the noun suffix '-al', not '-el' or '-le', even though the unstressed final syllable sounds like a vague schwa.

How the word is built

• re- (back)
• vers (turn, from Latin vertere)
• -al (noun-forming suffix)