Speech

• POS: Noun

CIDE DICTIONARY

Speech, n. [OE. speche, AS. spc, spr, fr. specan, sprecan, to speak; akin to D. spraak speech, OHG. sprāhha, G. sprache, Sw. sprk, Dan. sprog. See Speak.].

•  The faculty of uttering articulate sounds or words; the faculty of expressing thoughts by words or articulate sounds; the power of speaking.  [1913 Webster]

  "There is none comparable to the variety of instructive expressions by speech, wherewith man alone is endowed for the communication of his thoughts."  [1913 Webster]
•  he act of speaking; that which is spoken; words, as expressing ideas; language; conversation.  [1913 Webster]

  " Speech is voice modulated by the throat, tongue, lips, etc., the modulation being accomplished by changing the form of the cavity of the mouth and nose through the action of muscles which move their walls."  [1913 Webster]

  "O goode God! how gentle and how kind
  Ye seemed by your speech and your visage
  The day that maked was our marriage."  [1913 Webster]

  "The acts of God . . . to human ears
  Can nort without process of speech be told."  [1913 Webster]
•  A particular language, as distinct from others; a tongue; a dialect.  [1913 Webster]

  "People of a strange speech and of an hard language."  [1913 Webster]
•  Talk; mention; common saying.  [1913 Webster]

  "The duke . . . did of me demand
  What was the speech among the Londoners
  Concerning the French journey."  [1913 Webster]
•  formal discourse in public; oration; harangue.  [1913 Webster]

  "The constant design of these orators, in all their speeches, was to drive some one particular point."  [1913 Webster]
•  ny declaration of thoughts.  [1913 Webster]

  "I. with leave of speech implored, . . . replied."  [1913 Webster]

Syn. Harangue; language; address; oration. See Harangue, and Language.

Speech, v. i. & t. 

 To make a speech; to harangue.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

Speech, n.
1 the faculty or act of speaking.
2 a formal public address.
3 a manner of speaking (a man of blunt speech).
4 a remark (after this speech he was silent).
5 the language of a nation, region, group, etc.
6 Mus. the act of sounding in an organ-pipe etc.

Idiom

the Queen's (or King's) Speech a statement including the Government's proposed measures read by the sovereign at the opening of Parliament. speech day Brit. an annual prize-giving day in many schools, usu. marked by speeches etc. speech-reading lip-reading. speech therapist a person who practises speech therapy. speech therapy treatment to improve defective speech. speech-writer a person employed to write speeches for a politician etc. to deliver.

Derivative

speechful adj.

Etymology

OE spr{aelig}c, later spec f. WG, rel. to SPEAK

THESAURUS

Speech

ESP, address, after-dinner speech, alliteration, allocution, allusion, anacoluthon, anadiplosis, analogy, anaphora, anastrophe, answer, answering, antiphrasis, antithesis, antonomasia, apophasis, aporia, aposiopesis, apostrophe, articulated, articulation, blast, bull session, catachresis, chalk talk, chiasmus, chinfest, choice of words, circumlocution, climax, commerce, communicating, communication, communicational, communion, communional, composition, confab, confabulation, congress, connection, contact, conversation, conversational, converse, conversion, correspondence, dealing, dealings, debate, declamation, dialect, dialogue, diatribe, diction, discourse, disquisition, duologue, ecphonesis, elocution, emphasis, enunciated, enunciation, eulogy, exchange, exclamation, exhortation, expression, filibuster, forensic, forensic address, formal speech, formulation, funeral oration, gemination, grammar, harangue, homily, hortatory address, hypallage, hyperbaton, hyperbole, idiom, inaugural, inaugural address, information, interacting, interaction, interactional, interactive, interchange, intercommunication, intercommunicational, intercommunicative, intercommunion, intercommunional, intercourse, interplay, interresponsive, interrogative, interrogatory, invective, inversion, irony, jargon, jeremiad, language, langue, lecture, line, lingo, lingua, lingual, linguistic, linguistic intercourse, litotes, locution, malapropism, meiosis, message, metaphor, metonymy, nuncupative, onomatopoeia, oral, oral communication, oration, oxymoron, palaver, paregmenon, parenthesis, parlance, parley, parol, parole, pep talk, periphrasis, peroration, personal usage, personification, philippic, phrase, phraseology, phrasing, pitch, pleonasm, prepared speech, prepared text, preterition, prolepsis, pronounced, public speech, question-and-answer session, questioning, reading, recital, recitation, regression, repetition, reply, response, responsive, rhetoric, said, sales pitch, sales talk, salutatory, salutatory address, sarcasm, say, screed, sermon, set speech, simile, similitude, social intercourse, song and dance, sounded, speaking, speech circuit, speech situation, speechification, speeching, spiel, spoken, spoonerism, syllepsis, symploce, synecdoche, talk, talkathon, talkfest, talking, telepathic, telepathy, tirade, tongue, touch, traffic, transmissional, trialogue, truck, two-way communication, unwritten, usage, use of words, usus loquendi, utterance, uttered, valediction, valedictory, valedictory address, verbal, verbalization, verbiage, vernacular, viva voce, vocal, vocalization, vocalized, voice, voiced, voiceful, voicing, wordage, wording, words, zeugma

ROGET THESAURUS

Speech

Language

N language, phraseology, speech, tongue, lingo, vernacular, mother tongue, vulgar tongue, native tongue, household words, King's English, Queen's English, dialect, confusion of tongues, Babel, pasigraphie, pantomime, onomatopoeia, betacism, mimmation, myatism, nunnation, pasigraphy, lexicology, philology, glossology, glottology, linguistics, chrestomathy, paleology, paleography, comparative grammar, literature, letters, polite literature, belles lettres, muses, humanities, literae humaniores, republic of letters, dead languages, classics, genius of language, scholarship, lingual, linguistic, dialectic, vernacular, current, bilingual, diglot, hexaglot, polyglot, literary, syllables govern the world.

Speech

N speech, faculty of speech, locution, talk, parlance, verbal intercourse, prolation, oral communication, word of mouth, parole, palaver, prattle, effusion, oration, recitation, delivery, say, speech, lecture, harangue, sermon, tirade, formal speech, peroration, speechifying, soliloquy, allocution, conversation, salutatory : screed: valedictory, oratory, elocution, eloquence, rhetoric, declamation, grandiloquence, multiloquence, burst of eloquence, facundity, flow of words, command of words, command of language, copia verborum, power of speech, gift of the gab, usus loquendi, speaker, spokesman, prolocutor, interlocutor, mouthpiece, Hermes, orator, oratrix, oratress, Demosthenes, Cicero, rhetorician, stump orator, platform orator, speechmaker, patterer, improvisatore, speaking, spoken, oral, lingual, phonetic, not written, unwritten, outspoken, eloquent, elocutionary, oratorical, rhetorical, declamatory, grandiloquent, talkative, Ciceronian, nuncupative, Tullian, orally, by word of mouth, viva voce, from the lips of, quoth he, said he, action is eloquence, pour the full tide of eloquence along, she speaks poignards and every word stabs, speech is but broken light upon the depth of the u, to try thy eloquence now 'tis time, speech, faculty of speech, locution, talk, parlance, verbal intercourse, prolation, oral communication, word of mouth, parole, palaver, prattle, effusion, oration, recitation, delivery, say, speech, lecture, harangue, sermon, tirade, formal speech, peroration, speechifying, soliloquy, allocution, conversation, salutatory : screed: valedictory, oratory, elocution, eloquence, rhetoric, declamation, grandiloquence, multiloquence, burst of eloquence, facundity, flow of words, command of words, command of language, copia verborum, power of speech, gift of the gab, usus loquendi, speaker, spokesman, prolocutor, interlocutor, mouthpiece, Hermes, orator, oratrix, oratress, Demosthenes, Cicero, rhetorician, stump orator, platform orator, speechmaker, patterer, improvisatore, speaking, spoken, oral, lingual, phonetic, not written, unwritten, outspoken, eloquent, elocutionary, oratorical, rhetorical, declamatory, grandiloquent, talkative, Ciceronian, nuncupative, Tullian, orally, by word of mouth, viva voce, from the lips of, quoth he, said he, action is eloquence, pour the full tide of eloquence along, she speaks poignards and every word stabs, speech is but broken light upon the depth of the u, to try thy eloquence now 'tis time.

Allocution

N allocution, alloquy, address, speech, apostrophe, interpellation, appeal, invocation, salutation, word in the ear, dialogism, platform, plank, audience.