corporation
noun
Simple meaning
A large business or organization created by law, with many members
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
kawrperayshuhnSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
kɔɹpɚˈeɪʃən
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.
noun
A body corporate, created by law or under authority of law, having a continuous existence independent of the existences of its members, and powers and liabilities distinct from those of its members.
The municipal governing body of a borough or city.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- A1 · Beginner (estimated)
- Frequency
- Very Common
- Typical Use
- General English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A body corporate, created by law or under authority of law, having a continuous existence independent of the existences of its members, and powers and liabilities distinct from those of its members.
Used this way, corporation is a specialist word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. This is a legal use: the wording is institutional and carries a defined meaning in law rather than a loose everyday one.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Clinical and technical
- Usage feel
- Technical and specialized
Where it naturally appears
- Law/legal
- Government/politics
- Academic writing
- Business/professional
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Nearby words
- corp , a specialist term, precise but narrower
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use corporation
- “The large corporation announced its quarterly earnings report yesterday.”noun
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
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Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Word family
Words built from the same root.
A noncommissioned officer in the Army or Air Force or Marines.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
That branch of jurisprudence that studies the laws governing corporations.
A corporation owned by a few people.
A corporation owned by a few people.
Stock is publicly traded but most is held by a few shareholders who have no plans to sell.
A federally sponsored corporation that insures accounts in national banks and other qualified institutions.
A corporation authorized by Congress to provide a secondary market for residential mortgages.
Related words
Connected by subject or meaning, not by word formation.
Of or belonging to a corporation.
The financial activities of corporation.
An executive in a business corporation.
A bond issued by a corporation.
A legal document that creates a corporation.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- entitynoun
- subsidiarynoun
- companynoun
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: body corporate or created by law
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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.