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set about

verb

Simple meaning

To start doing or to devote oneself to some task.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

sehtuhbowt

Say the bold part a little louder.

US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈsɛtəˈbaʊt

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.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

verb

  1. intransitive

    To start doing or to devote oneself to some task; to set upon.

  2. Used with the adverb sense of about.

  3. transitiveUKinformal

    To attack (someone); to set upon.

  4. Used with the preposition sense of about.

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: To start doing or to devote oneself to some task; to set upon.

Used this way, set about is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
No strong connotation
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

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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.