Technician

How to spell technician

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce technician

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does technician mean?

1. nounA person trained to carry out the practical or mechanical side of a particular field or piece of equipment.

Technician in a sentence

• The lab technician calibrated the machine before the first test.

• A qualified technician arrived to repair the broken air conditioning unit.

Where does technician come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word traces back to the Greek tekhne, which meant 'art, craft, or skill', the same root that gives us 'technical', 'technology', and 'technique'. The modern noun was formed in English in the early nineteenth century by taking the adjective 'technical' and adding the suffix -ician, the same ending that turns 'music' into 'musician' and 'politics' into 'politician', to name a person expert in a particular practical field. The suffix itself descends through Old French and Latin from a Greek pattern for naming practitioners. Originally it described someone skilled in the technical details or mechanics of an art, but it broadened to mean any trained specialist who carries out practical, hands-on work. The spelling trap lives in that -ician ending, which sounds like 'ishun' yet is written with a c, an i, and the silent-feeling -ian, exactly mirroring the Greek tekhne hidden at the front.

How the word is built

• techn- (from Greek tekhne: art, craft, skill)
• -ician (one skilled in or practising a particular field)