care
pronunciation
How to pronounce care in British English:
UK [keə(r)]
How to pronounce care in American English:
US [ker]
-
- Noun:
- the work of caring for or attending to someone or something
- judiciousness in avoiding harm or danger
- an anxious feeling
- a cause for feeling concern
- attention and management implying responsibility for safety
- activity involved in maintaining something in good working order
-
- Verb:
- feel concern or interest
- provide care for
- prefer or wish to do something
- be in charge of, act on, or dispose of
- be concerned with
Word Origin
- care
- care: [OE] Care goes back ultimately to a prehistoric Indo-European *gar-, source of a wide range of words in other Indo-European languages, two of which, garrulous and slogan, have also reached English. In the case of care, the route was via Germanic *karō, which reached Old English as caru. The related adjective from the same source is chary [OE], which originally meant ‘sad’.=> chary, garrulous, slogan
- care (n.)
- Old English caru, cearu "sorrow, anxiety, grief," also "burdens of mind; serious mental attention," from Proto-Germanic *karo "lament; grief, care" (see care (v.)). Different sense evolution in related Dutch karig "scanty, frugal," German karg "stingy, scanty." The sense development in English is from "cry" to "lamentation" to "grief." Meaning "charge, oversight, protection" is attested c. 1400, the sense in care of in addressing. To take care of "take in hand, do" is from 1580s.
- care (v.)
- Old English carian, cearian "be anxious, grieve; to feel concern or interest," from Proto-Germanic *karo- "lament," hence "grief, care" (cognates: Old High German charon "to lament," Old Saxon karon "to care, to sorrow"), from Proto-Germanic *karo (cognates: Old Saxon kara "sorrow;" Old High German chara "wail, lament;" Gothic kara "sorrow, trouble, care;" German Karfreitag "Good Friday"), from PIE root *gar- "cry out, call, scream" (cognates: Irish gairm "shout, cry, call;" see garrulous). OED emphasizes that it is in "no way related to L. cura." Related: Cared; caring. Positive senses, such as "have an inclination" (1550s); "have fondness for" (1520s) seem to have developed later as mirrors to the earlier negative ones. To not care as a negative dismissal is attested from mid-13c. Phrase couldn't care less is from 1946; could care less in the same sense (with an understood negative) is from 1957. Care also figures in many "similies of indifference" in the form don't care a _____, with the blank filled by fig, pin, button, cent, straw, rush, point, farthing, snap, etc., etc.
Synonym
Example
- 1. Who will care for the fallen ?
- 2. Child care has increasingly become a profession .
- 3. For many years I worked in palliative care .
- 4. These pups need as much care as human babies do .
- 5. Few care much about optimal policy .