shear
verb · noun
Simple meaning
To cut off hair or wool from an animal.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
shirIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈʃɪɹ
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
To cut the hair of (a person).
To cut, originally with a sword or other bladed weapon, now usually with shears, or as if using shears.
Cut or cut through with shears
intransitivetransitive
To remove the fleece from (a sheep, llama, etc.) by clipping.
figurative
To deprive of property; to fleece.
noun
The act of shearing, or something removed by shearing.
A cutting tool similar to scissors, but often larger.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- Neutral / general English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: To cut the hair of (a person).
Used this way, shear 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.
More ways to use shear
- “The shear changed the quadrilateral into a parallelogram.”noun
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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.
Large scissors with strong blades.
Removing by cutting off or clipping.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
Shears with strong blades used for light pruning of woody plants.
The elasticity of a body that has been pulled out of shape by a shearing force.
Shears with one serrate blade.
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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.