stride
pronunciation
How to pronounce stride in British English:
UK [straɪd]
How to pronounce stride in American English:
US [straɪd]
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- Noun:
- a step in walking or running
- the distance covered by a step
- significant progress (especially in the phrase "make strides")
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- Verb:
- walk with long steps
- cover or traverse by taking long steps
Word Origin
- stride
- stride: [OE] Stride comes from a prehistoric Germanic base *strīd-, whose other descendants (German streiten and Dutch strijden ‘quarrel’, Swedish and Danish strid ‘strife, affliction’) suggest a basic underlying meaning ‘severity, great effort’. There may also be a link with English strife and strive. Straddle [16] comes from a variant of the same base. The use of the plural noun strides for ‘trousers’ dates from the late 19th century.=> straddle
- stride (v.)
- Old English stridan (past tense strad, past participle striden), "to straddle, mount" (a horse), from Proto-Germanic *stridanan (cognates: Middle Low German strede "stride, strive;" Old Saxon stridian, Danish stride, Swedish strida "to fight," Dutch stridjen, Old High German stritan, German etreiten "to fight, contend, struggle," Old Norse striðr "strong, hard, stubborn, severe"). The sense connection in the various Germanic forms is perhaps "strive, make a strong effort;" the senses having to do with walking and standing are found only in English and Low German. Meaning "to walk with long or extended steps" is from c. 1200. Cognate words in most Germanic languages mean "to fight, struggle;" the notion behind the English usage might be the effort involved in making long strides, striving forward.
- stride (n.)
- "a step in walking," especially a long one, from Old English stride "a stride, a step," from the root of stride (v.). Compare Dutch strijd, Old High German strit, German Streit "fight, contention, combat," Swedish and Danish strid "combat, contention." From c. 1300 as a measure of distance roughly the length of a stride. Figurative meaning "advance rapidly, make progress" is from c. 1600. Of animals (especially horses) from early 17c. To take (something) in stride (1832), i.e. "without change of gait," originally is of horses leaping hedges in the hunting-field; figurative sense attested from 1902. To hit (one's) stride is from horse-racing. Jazz music stride tempo is attested from 1938. Meaning "a standing with the legs apart, a straddle" is from 1590s.
Example
- 1. Stand up straight and stride besuited into your office you might find you start getting bigger clients .
- 2. Instead of flying off the handle every time something bad happens , you could take it all in stride .
- 3. They took criticisms in their stride , carried on and now they 're one of the most successful companies in the world .
- 4. It was by one stride that abrahams won the gold .
- 5. The demon took another stride forward , carrying with it a smell of rotting fish .