Responsibility

• POS: Noun
• HYPHEN: re=spon=si=bil=i=ty

CIDE DICTIONARY

Responsibility, n. [Cf. F. responsabilité.].

•  The state of being responsible, accountable, or answerable, as for a trust, debt, or obligation.  [1913 Webster]
•  That for which anyone is responsible or accountable; as, the resonsibilities of power.  [1913 Webster]
•  Ability to answer in payment; means of paying.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

Responsibility, n. (pl. -ies)
1 a (often foll. by for, of) the state or fact of being responsible (refuses all responsibility for it; will take the responsibility of doing it). b authority; the ability to act independently and make decisions (a job with more responsibility).
2 the person or thing for which one is responsible (the food is my responsibility).

Idiom

on one's own responsibility without authorization.

DEVIL DICTIONARY

Responsibility

n. A detachable burden easily shifted to the shoulders of God, Fate, Fortune, Luck or one's neighbor. In the days of astrology it was customary to unload it upon a star.

Alas, things ain't what we should see
If Eve had let that apple be;
And many a feller which had ought
To set with monarchses of thought,
Or play some rosy little game
With battle-chaps on fields of fame,
Is downed by his unlucky star
And hollers: "Peanuts! -- here you are!"
"The Sturdy Beggar"

THESAURUS

Responsibility

accountability, accountableness, accounting for, action, agency, agentship, amenability, answerability, answerableness, application, arrogation, ascription, assignation, assignment, attachment, attribution, auspices, authority, authorization, blame, bossing, brevet, burden, care, charge, chargeability, commission, commissioning, commitment, conduct, connection with, consignment, credit, culpability, cure, dedication to duty, delegated authority, delegation, dependability, deputation, derivation from, devolution, devolvement, devotion to duty, direction, driving, duteousness, dutifulness, duty, embassy, empowerment, entrusting, entrustment, errand, etiology, execution, executorship, exequatur, exercise, eye, factorship, faithworthiness, fault, full power, functioning, guilt, handling, honor, imputation, incorruptibility, incumbency, intendance, inviolability, job, jurisdiction, legation, liability, license, lieutenancy, management, mandate, manipulation, mission, obligation, occupation, office, onus, operancy, operation, oversight, palaetiology, performance, performing, placement, plenipotentiary power, power of attorney, power to act, practice, procuration, proxy, purview, reference to, regency, regentship, reliability, responsibleness, role, running, saddling, sense of duty, sense of obligation, stability, steering, superintendence, supervision, sureness, surveillance, task, trust, trustability, trusteeship, trustiness, trustworthiness, unfalseness, unperfidiousness, untreacherousness, vicarious authority, warrant, work, working, workings

ROGET THESAURUS

Responsibility

Duty

N duty, what ought to be done, moral obligation, accountableness, liability, onus, responsibility, bounden duty, imperative duty, call, call of duty, accountability, allegiance, fealty, tie engagement, part, function, calling, morality, morals, decalogue, case of conscience, conscientiousness, conscience, inward monitor, still small voice within, sense of duty, tender conscience, superego, the hell within, dueness, propriety, fitness, seemliness, amenability, decorum, to prepon, the thing, the proper thing, the right thing to do, the proper thing to do, ethics, ethology, deontology, aretology, moral philosophy, ethical philosophy, casuistry, polity, observance, fulfillment, discharge, performance, acquittal, satisfaction, redemption, good behavior, obligatory, binding, imperative, peremptory, stringent, behooving, incumbent on, chargeable on, under obligation, obliged by, bound by, tied by, saddled with, due to, beholden to, bound to, indebted to, tied down, compromised, in duty bound, amenable, liable, accountable, responsible, answerable, right, meet, moral, ethical, casuistical, conscientious, ethological, with a safe conscience, as in duty, bound, on one's own responsibility, at one's own risk, suo periculo, in foro conscientiae, quamdiu se bene gesserit, dura lex sed lex, dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, honos habet onus, leve fit quod bene fertur onus, loyaute m'oblige, simple duty bath no place for fear, stern daughter of the voice of God, there is a higher law than the Constitution.