canvass
verb · noun
Simple meaning
To seek the support of in a forthcoming election or poll through personal solicitation or public addresses.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
kanvuhsSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈkænvəs
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
verb
transitivefigurativelyspecificallypolitics
To seek the support of (voters or a constituency) in a forthcoming election or poll through personal solicitation or public addresses.
intransitive
To seek or solicit donations, information, opinions, support, etc.; to conduct a survey.
transitivefiguratively
To seek or solicit donations, information, opinions, support, etc. from (people or a place)
transitivefiguratively
To thoroughly examine or investigate (something) physically or by discussion; to debate, to gather opinion, to scrutinize.
intransitive
To debate, to discuss.
noun
countable
A seeking or solicitation of donations, information, opinions, support, etc.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient
- Frequency
- Rare
- Typical Use
- Primarily written
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: (specifically, politics) To seek the support of (voters or a constituency) in a forthcoming election or poll through personal solicitation or public addresses.
Used this way, canvass is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in government or politics contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- No strong connotation
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Government/politics
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Inflected forms
Grammatical variations of the same word.
Persuasion of voters in a political campaign.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- pacnoun
- congressionaladjective
- electionnoun
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Words can change meaning depending on context.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.