| / English Dictionary |
ALLOWANCE
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
The act of allowing
Example:
He objected to the allowance of smoking in the dining room
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("allowance" is a kind of...):
license; permission; permit (the act of giving a formal (usually written) authorization)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "allowance"):
tolerance (the act of tolerating something)
Derivation:
allow (allow the presence of or allow (an activity) without opposing or prohibiting)
Sense 2
Meaning:
A permissible difference; allowing some freedom to move within limits
Synonyms:
allowance; leeway; margin; tolerance
Classified under:
Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects
Hypernyms ("allowance" is a kind of...):
disagreement; discrepancy; divergence; variance (a difference between conflicting facts or claims or opinions)
Derivation:
allow (allow the presence of or allow (an activity) without opposing or prohibiting)
Sense 3
Meaning:
An amount added or deducted on the basis of qualifying circumstances
Example:
an allowance for profit
Synonyms:
adjustment; allowance
Classified under:
Nouns denoting possession and transfer of possession
Hypernyms ("allowance" is a kind of...):
recompense (payment or reward (as for service rendered))
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "allowance"):
cost-of-living allowance (an allowance for changes in the consumer price index)
depreciation allowance (an allowance for loss due to depreciation)
deduction; discount (an amount or percentage deducted)
seasonal adjustment (a statistical adjustment made to accommodate predictable fluctuations as a function of the season of the year)
tare (an adjustment made for the weight of the packaging in order to determine the net weight of the goods)
Sense 4
Meaning:
An amount allowed or granted (as during a given period)
Example:
a child's allowance should not be too generous
Classified under:
Nouns denoting possession and transfer of possession
Hypernyms ("allowance" is a kind of...):
part; percentage; portion; share (assets belonging to or due to or contributed by an individual person or group)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "allowance"):
privy purse (allowance for a monarch's personal expenses)
Derivation:
allow (give or assign a resource to a particular person or cause)
allowance (put on a fixed allowance, as of food)
Sense 5
Meaning:
A sum granted as reimbursement for expenses
Classified under:
Nouns denoting possession and transfer of possession
Hypernyms ("allowance" is a kind of...):
reimbursement (compensation paid (to someone) for damages or losses or money already spent etc.)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "allowance"):
per diem (a daily allowance for living expenses (especially while traveling in connection with your job))
travel allowance; travel reimbursement (a sum allowed for travel)
Sense 6
Meaning:
A reserve fund created by a charge against profits in order to provide for changes in the value of a company's assets
Synonyms:
allowance; allowance account; valuation account; valuation reserve
Classified under:
Nouns denoting possession and transfer of possession
Hypernyms ("allowance" is a kind of...):
reserve account; reserve fund (funds taken out of earnings to provide for anticipated future payments)
II. (verb)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Put on a fixed allowance, as of food
Classified under:
Verbs of buying, selling, owning
Hypernyms (to "allowance" is one way to...):
allow; grant (let have)
Sentence frame:
Somebody ----s somebody something
Derivation:
allowance (an amount allowed or granted (as during a given period))
Context examples:
“Why, yes,” returned the captain, scratching his head; “and making a large allowance, sir, for all the gifts of Providence, I should say we were pretty close hauled.”
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
While the recommended daily allowance for magnesium is 420 mg for males and 320 mg for females, the standard diet in the United States contains only about 50 percent of that amount.
(Low Magnesium Levels Make Vitamin D Ineffective, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)
The queen, giving great allowance for my defectiveness in speaking, was, however, surprised at so much wit and good sense in so diminutive an animal.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
Every allowance will be made for you.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
And is no allowance to be made for inadvertence, or for spirits depressed by recent disappointment?
(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)
Mrs. Churchill, after being disliked at least twenty-five years, was now spoken of with compassionate allowances.
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
I think I can answer for the young ladies making allowance for a bachelor's table.
(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)
I do not suppose that, when a drunkard reasons with himself upon his vice, he is once out of five hundred times affected by the dangers that he runs through his brutish, physical insensibility; neither had I, long as I had considered my position, made enough allowance for the complete moral insensibility and insensate readiness to evil, which were the leading characters of Edward Hyde.
(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
The customary allowance of food and drink taken by a person or an animal from day to day, particularly one especially planned to meet specific requirements of the individual, including or excluding certain items of food; a prescribed course of eating and drinking in which the amount and kind of food, as well as the times at which it is to be taken, are regulated for therapeutic purposes or selected with reference to a particular state of health.
(Diet, NCI Thesaurus)
“I have only to raise my voice and I could call my servants and have you arrested. But I will make allowance for your natural anger. Leave the room at once as you came, and I will say no more.”
(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
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