| / English Dictionary |
SWEEPING
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
The act of cleaning with a broom
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("sweeping" is a kind of...):
cleaning; cleansing; cleanup (the act of making something clean)
Derivation:
sweep (sweep with a broom or as if with a broom)
sweep (clean by sweeping)
II. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Ignoring distinctions
Example:
wholesale destruction
Synonyms:
sweeping; wholesale
Classified under:
Similar:
indiscriminate (not marked by fine distinctions)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Taking in or moving over (or as if over) a wide area; often used in combination
Example:
a wide-sweeping view of the river
Classified under:
Similar:
broad; wide (having great (or a certain) extent from one side to the other)
III. (verb)
Sense 1
-ing form of the verb sweep
Context examples:
His eyes embraced the dead and wounded in a sweeping glance.
(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)
It was now winter again; and the fresh, cold windy day, and the sweeping downland, brightened up my hopes a little.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
The sweeping style suits you best, and you must learn to trail your skirts gracefully.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
My uncle shrugged his shoulders carelessly, and took a pinch of his snuff with that inimitable sweeping gesture which no man has ever ventured to imitate.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Sweeping the glass all around us I could see here and there dots moving singly and in twos and threes and larger numbers—the wolves were gathering for their prey.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
Sweeping over the glassy surface was a great flotilla of canoes coming straight for the shore upon which we stood.
(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
The hypar origami form, with its sweeping opposing arcs and saddle shape, has long been popular with artists working in the paper-folding tradition.
(Saddle-shaped origami enables new microelectronic applications, National Science Foundation)
The meadows beyond what will be the garden, as well as what now is, sweeping round from the lane I stood in to the north-east, that is, to the principal road through the village, must be all laid together, of course; very pretty meadows they are, finely sprinkled with timber.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
The echoing chamber of his soul was a narrow room, a conning tower, whence were directed his arm and shoulder muscles, his ten nimble fingers, and the swift-moving iron along its steaming path in broad, sweeping strokes, just so many strokes and no more, just so far with each stroke and not a fraction of an inch farther, rushing along interminable sleeves, sides, backs, and tails, and tossing the finished shirts, without rumpling, upon the receiving frame.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
From either side they were sweeping down from room to room and from bastion to bastion in the direction of the keep.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
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