Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A crucial or decisive point or situation; a turning point.
- n. An unstable condition, as in political, social, or economic affairs, involving an impending abrupt or decisive change.
- n. A sudden change in the course of a disease or fever, toward either improvement or deterioration.
- n. An emotionally stressful event or traumatic change in a person's life.
- n. A point in a story or drama when a conflict reaches its highest tension and must be resolved.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A vitally important or decisive state of things; the point of culmination; a turning-point; the point at which a change must come, either for the better or the worse, or from one state of things to another: as, a ministerial crisis; a financial crisis; a crisis in a person's mental condition.
- n. In medicine, the change of a disease which indicates the nature of its termination; that change which prognosticates recovery or death. The term is sometimes also used to denote the symptoms accompanying the condition.
- n. A paroxysm of acute localized pain or of functional disturbance of some organ accompanying tabes dorsalis or other degenerative affection of the spinal cord.
Wiktionary
- n. A crucial or decisive point or situation; a turning point.
- n. An unstable situation, in political, social, economic or military affairs, especially one involving an impending abrupt change.
- n. A sudden change in the course of a disease, usually at which the patient is expected to recover or die.
- n. psychology A traumatic or stressful change in a person's life.
- n. drama A point in a drama at which a conflict reaches a peak before being resolved.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The point of time when it is to be decided whether any affair or course of action must go on, or be modified or terminate; the decisive moment; the turning point.
- n. (Med.) That change in a disease which indicates whether the result is to be recovery or death; sometimes, also, a striking change of symptoms attended by an outward manifestation, as by an eruption or sweat.
WordNet 3.0
- n. an unstable situation of extreme danger or difficulty
- n. a crucial stage or turning point in the course of something
Etymologies
- From Ancient Greek κρίσις (krisis, "a separating, power of distinguishing, decision, choice, election, judgment, dispute"), from κρίνω (krinō, "pick out, choose, decide, judge") (Wiktionary)
- Middle English, from Latin, judgment, from Greek krisis, from krīnein, to separate, judge; see krei- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Promoted to Headline (H3) on 10/25/08: The Crash: The Plot Thickens yahooBuzzArticleHeadline = 'The Crash: The Plot Thickens'; yahooBuzzArticleSummary = 'Article: In recent days, a possible motive for the current financial crisis has been suggested by the crisis\' own architects themselves. ”
“Trust yahooBuzzArticleHeadline = 'Trust'; yahooBuzzArticleSummary = 'Article: At the bottom of the \'financial crisis\' is a crisis of trust.”
“The mood is that the economic crisis in UK is better than the crisis in Poland.”
“The system is working" to manage what Alan Greenspan is calling a once in a century event. and the rest of this week's meltdown (from oldest to newest) ... video: wamu looking for buyer* obama: help for US finance crisis needed from abroad* wall st journal: one week later, a new world order* industrials: biggest 2 day rally since 1929* china blames wall st meltdown on fed overissuance of currency* dodd: the US may be 'days away from a complete meltdown of our financial system'* failed bank list* we have only days to stop the $700b stick-up (& fascist powergrab) * regulators shut down ameribank in west virginia* in hard times, tent cities rise across the country* growing' tent cities 'blamed on foreclosure crisis*”
“I think where they lost, if anywhere, was when Brenda Ekwurzel of Union of Concerned Scientists was responding to the question, “…if this is a crisis, what kind of lifestyle change, what kind of economic pain, and how quickly are you proposing…to hedge our bets?” with “ASAP … As soon as possible because’€” … Everything, everything that we can throw at solving this climate crisis’€”well, this climate problem, is important…””
“The term crisis comes from the Greek origin, meaning circle ( "kreis" in German).”
“The single most important line of defense for young people in crisis is a network of visibly supportive adults, in their own community, in school, at home," Byard said.”
The Huffington Post: Support, Counseling, Education For Gay Youth Just A Click Away
“Just as the phrase "crisis of confidence" characterized the U.S. credit freeze after Lehman Brothers went bankrupt in 2008, it has become shorthand for in the debt crisis of Europe, too.”
The Huffington Post: Jeff Reeves: The Only Thing That Will Save the Economy in 2012
“The symbol for the word crisis in Chinese is made up of two words: danger and opportunity.”
“When written in Chinese, the word crisis is composed of two characters.”
Simon & Schuster: Chicken Soup for the Soul: Tough Times, Tough People
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘crisis’.
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EU Buzz - ALL words and expressions
A combined list of
1. EU Buzz - single words
2. EU Buzz - collocations
3. EU Buzz - the 100 most active
collocation constituentsabsorption capacity, absorption rate, acceding country, accession candidate, accession countries, accession country, accession criteria, accession cycle, accession negotia..., accession partner..., accession priorities, accession treaty and 2650 more...
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Headlines & Newsmakers
frugality, environment, extinction, bible, killer, jazz, cloning, dead, god, moon, global warming, bailout and 340 more...
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11250 more...
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MANY A WORD!
This is just a list, right, that I'm gonna, like, fill with words, that, like, are every word that I can, like, think of with, ahhmm, my brain.
and, able, art, ass, algebra, amp, ankle, booze, bong, aura, bling, bright and 134 more...
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EU Buzz - Lisbon Treaty
All words of the Lisbon Treaty
(Persons' names, foreign and grammatical words have been eliminated, MWEs have been split up into individual words. Capitalization has been retained if r...conferral, stateless, person, voting, right, subsidiarity, Latvia, Malta, Slovenia, Lithuania, Finland, Estonia and 2614 more...
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EU Buzz - single words (1+2+3)
1. Strictly EU terms with special European meaning used only in the EU
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2. Keywords central to the understanding of the EU (people working for the EU are usually able to give thematic...acceleration, action, additionality, administrator, agenda, agricultural, agri-environmental, agriflation, agri-food, applicant, approach, assent and 1325 more...
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Duplicated Endings
Not an exhaustive list (there are probably scores of -erers and -ededs and -eses and -osos).
slyly, queue, caterer, malingerer, needed, stampeded, theses, cheeses, virtuosos, crisis, panini, banana and 9 more...
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EU Buzz - 100 most active collocation...
The 100 most frequent constituents of EU collocations. People working for the EU are able to complete any of these words to a multiple-word expression with ease. Try it out if you are one! For a gr...
accession, acquis, act, action, agenda, agreement, aid, area, assistance, association, base, budget and 88 more...
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eggplantia5's Words
scintillate, marvel, cranberry, oscillate, triumph, bamboozle, grimace, magical, book, hexagon, cipher, compendium and 2727 more...
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Basic English Vocabulary
Very basic words for ESL students.
a, abandon, ability, able, abortion, about, above, abroad, absence, absolute, absolutely, absorb and 4334 more...
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Prosie: Obama's Inaugural Address
In keeping with my other Prosies (like this one). There were a number of phrases as well as words in this speech that I found particularly compelling.
My fellow citizens: I stand here ...we did not turn b..., when we were tested, what storms may come, icy currents, virtue, hope, alarmed, depth of winter, revolution, snow, enemy, abandoned and 257 more...
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Jigsaw Codex
List? What list?
This is the list that makes up the world.cat, boustrophedon, syndetic, life, imbroglio, interlude, composition, investigation, cantankerous, him, sign, universality and 189 more...
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European World Systems
europe, colonization, defense, barter, feudalism, gunpowder, technology, guns, domination, lords, monarchs, transition and 250 more...
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Next!
salvific, redemptive, salvic, roil, changeling, barrow, burro, sow, swath, haymow, shock, sheaves and 190 more...
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Prosie: The Crisis
By Thomas Paine. Published on December 23, 1776 (later published as The American Crisis). Posted here as excerpts, not in entirety.
THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer s...unlamented, wretch, bawdy-houses, ravaged, slain, widow, orphan, terror, fleeing, shrieking, horrid, brutish and 40 more...
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stevebrullecheckitout
diurnal, furlough, half-life, hourglass, hazard, chintz, palaver, sylvan, staid, curt, winsome, adroit and 52 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for crisis.

reesetee How sad. Dec 11, 2007
bilby Something like this. Dec 11, 2007
reesetee Oh, I suspect more people than not have had similar experiences.... :-) Sep 21, 2007
npydyuan That's comforting. Thanks. :-) Sep 21, 2007
reesetee You're not alone, npydyuan! ;-) Sep 21, 2007
npydyuan Is there a good word for the sociocognitive dissonance that occurs when you suddenly realize that, despite having several identifiable traits in common with someone else, your assumptions about further commonality or compatibility with them are false?
Just asking, 'cuz that's happened to me a few times. Sep 21, 2007