GUARDIANSHIP

Pronunciation (US): (GB):

I. (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The responsibility of a guardian or keeper

Example:

he left his car in my keeping

Synonyms:

guardianship; keeping; safekeeping

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Hypernyms ("guardianship" is a kind of...):

duty; obligation; responsibility (the social force that binds you to the courses of action demanded by that force)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "guardianship"):

custody; hands ((with 'in') guardianship over; in divorce cases it is the right to house and care for and discipline a child)

Derivation:

guardian (a person who cares for persons or property)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Attention and management implying responsibility for safety

Example:

he is in the care of a bodyguard

Synonyms:

care; charge; guardianship; tutelage

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Hypernyms ("guardianship" is a kind of...):

protection (the activity of protecting someone or something)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "guardianship"):

due care; ordinary care; reasonable care (the care that a reasonable man would exercise under the circumstances; the standard for determining legal duty)

foster care (supervised care for delinquent or neglected children usually in an institution or substitute home)

great care (more attention and consideration than is normally bestowed by prudent persons)

providence (the guardianship and control exercised by a deity)

slight care (such care as a careless or inattentive person would exercise)

Derivation:

guardian (a person who cares for persons or property)

Credits

Context examples:

It had no park, but the pleasure-grounds were tolerably extensive; and like every other place of the same degree of importance, it had its open shrubbery, and closer wood walk, a road of smooth gravel winding round a plantation, led to the front, the lawn was dotted over with timber, the house itself was under the guardianship of the fir, the mountain-ash, and the acacia, and a thick screen of them altogether, interspersed with tall Lombardy poplars, shut out the offices.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

As a brother, a landlord, a master, she considered how many people's happiness were in his guardianship!—how much of pleasure or pain was it in his power to bestow!—how much of good or evil must be done by him!