describe
verb/dɪˈskraɪb/
/dɪˈskraɪb/
Verb Forms
| present simple I / you / we / they describe | /dɪˈskraɪb/ /dɪˈskraɪb/ |
| he / she / it describes | /dɪˈskraɪbz/ /dɪˈskraɪbz/ |
| past simple described | /dɪˈskraɪbd/ /dɪˈskraɪbd/ |
| past participle described | /dɪˈskraɪbd/ /dɪˈskraɪbd/ |
| -ing form describing | /dɪˈskraɪbɪŋ/ /dɪˈskraɪbɪŋ/ |
- to say what somebody/something is like
- describe somebody/something The next section describes our findings in detail.
- to describe a method/process/situation
- describe somebody/something to somebody Can you describe him to me?
- describe somebody/something for somebody They described for us exactly what happened.
- describe somebody/something as something The man was described as tall and dark, and aged about 20.
- describe yourself as something She describes herself as an artist.
- describe how, what, etc… Describe how you did it.
- Words cannot describe what I felt at that moment.
- describe doing something Witnesses described seeing strange lights in the sky.
Express Yourself Describing a pictureDescribing a pictureIn some exams, you have to describe what you see in a picture or photograph. Here are some useful phrases:- The picture shows a family gathered around a kitchen table.
- This is a photo of a busy city street.
- In the foreground, we can see a group of protesters.
- In the background, there are some trees.
- In the top left-hand corner, there's a child sitting alone.
- On the right, someone is standing with a bunch of flowers in his hand.
- In the cartoon, we can see two people looking at a newspaper headline.
- The cartoonist has drawn the man to represent a typical businessman.
Extra Examples- The area I grew up in is described as semi-rural.
- She described briefly what happened.
- He goes on to describe very vividly how Caesar was stabbed to death.
- He goes on to describe vividly how Lincoln was assassinated.
- Observers have described the situation in the country as ‘serious’.
- The shirt was variously described as ‘pink’, ‘salmon’ and ‘rose’.
- Their daily lives are described in detail.
- This process is fully described in section three of the book.
- Words cannot describe our feelings at that moment.
- Jim was described by his colleagues as ‘unusual’.
- The current political situation in Vietnam is described in chapter 8.
- Production data were collected and analysed by methods previously described for Trial 1.
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadverb- accurately
- exactly
- in detail
- …
- cannot
- be difficult to
- be hard to
- …
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- describe something (formal or specialist) to make a movement that has a particular shape; to form a particular shape
- The shark described a circle around the shoal of fish.
- The road describes a long loop around the town.
Word Originlate Middle English: from Latin describere, from de- ‘down’ + scribere ‘write’.
Check pronunciation:
describe