call

Woman making a telephone call (1964).

Meanings

Noun

  • A telephone conversation; a phone call.
  • An instance of calling someone on the telephone.
  • A short visit, usually for social purposes.
  • A visit by a ship or boat to a port.
  • A cry or shout.
  • A decision or judgement.
  • The characteristic cry of a bird or other animal.
  • A beckoning or summoning.
  • The right to speak at a given time during a debate or other public event; the floor.
  • The act of calling to the other batsman.
  • The state of being the batsman whose role it is to call (depends on where the ball goes.)
  • A work shift which requires one to be available when requested (see on call).
  • The act of jumping to a subprogram, saving the means to return to the original point.
  • A statement of a particular state, or rule, made in many games such as bridge, craps, jacks, and so on.
  • The act of matching a bet made by a player who has previously bet in the same round of betting.
  • A note blown on the horn to encourage the dogs in a hunt.
  • A whistle or pipe, used by the boatswain and his mate to summon the sailors to duty.
  • A pipe or other instrument to call birds or animals by imitating their note or cry. A game call.
  • An invitation to take charge of or serve a church as its pastor.
  • Vocation; employment; calling.
  • A reference to, or statement of, an object, course, distance, or other matter of description in a survey or grant requiring or calling for a corresponding object, etc., on the land.
  • A meeting with a client for paid sex; hookup; job.
  • A lawyer who was called to the Bar (became licensed as a lawyer) in a specified year.

Verb

  • To visit.
  • Direct or indirect use of the voice.
  • To require, demand.
  • To lay claim to an object or role which is up for grabs.
  • To announce the early extinction of a debt by prepayment, usually at a premium.
  • To demand repayment of a loan.
  • To jump to (another part of a program) to perform some operation, returning to the original point on completion.

Related

Narrower meaning words

Origin

  • From Middle English callen, from Old English ceallian and Old Norse kalla; both from Proto-Germanic *kalzōną, from Proto-Indo-European *gal(o)s-, *glōs-, *golH-so-. Cognate with Scots call, caw, ca, Dutch kallen, German dialectal kallen, Swedish kalla, Norwegian kalle, Icelandic kalla, Welsh galw, Polish głos, Lithuanian gal̃sas, Russian голос, Albanian gjuhë ("language, tongue").

Modern English dictionary

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