assign oxford dictionary

QuestionsAnswered.net

What's Your Question?

The Best Dictionaries for Kids

The big dictionaries strive to compile every word that can be found so there is a complete record of a language. The Oxford English Dictionary , published in the late 19th century, set the framework for dictionaries around the world. Smaller-sized dictionaries include words that are likely to be looked up.

Characteristics of a Good Dictionary for Children

Good children’s dictionaries include complete and easy to understand definitions along with helpful illustrations or photos. Visuals combined with words make it easier to grasp even the most difficult concepts. The average person uses only a small fraction of available words and phrases. A comprehensive dictionary that includes a complete list of commonly used words can help your child improve his grammar and increase his knowledge of the English language as well as improve his spelling.

How to Choose the Best Dictionary for Your Child

Be sure you choose a recent edition when you buy a dictionary for your child since the English language has become more fluid in recent years. Resist the urge to buy a dictionary that your child can use throughout his school years. Instead, buy an age appropriate dictionary that is specifically designed for your child’s age group. Dictionaries come in a range of formats, from coffee table style books to pocket style books that are easy to carry. Therefore, a dictionary is available to suit your child’s particular needs.

Dictionaries for Children

ThoughtCo, an online reference site that focuses on expert-created education content, recommends several dictionaries. The Merriam-Webster Children’s Dictionary , with over 35,000 words and phrases, is an ideal resource for children in elementary school. Many dictionaries come with special appendices, pictures and more. Thorndike Barnhart Children’s Dictionary also includes over 35,000 words and phrases along with a 14-page reference section. An older child may benefit from a combination dictionary and thesaurus.

Specialty Dictionaries

Every dictionary is compiled with a specific group of users in mind. Your child will be motivated to use the dictionary that you purchase for him if it has a theme that he finds interesting. For example, the Roald Dahl Dictionary features Dahl’s inimitable vocabulary along with Quentin Blake’s well-known illustrations. The Oxford First Dictionary , featuring computer-generated images, may interest your child if he enjoys computer games. The Multicultural Children´s Visual Dictionary comes in four languages.

Online Dictionaries

Online Dictionaries for children are numerous. Visual Dictionary Online explores 15 major themes while The Internet Picture Dictionary connects words with images. Kids.Wordsmyth is a full-featured dictionary that includes photographs, animations, synonyms and pronunciations. Little Explorers Picture Dictionary, offered by EnchantedLearning.com, allows for additional research of a particular topic or word. The multilingual picture dictionary provides links to child-friendly sites, making it simple to surf the web. Fact Monster also offers many resources in addition to an online dictionary.

MORE FROM QUESTIONSANSWERED.NET

• Dictionaries home
• American English
• Collocations
• German-English
• Grammar home
• Practical English Usage
• Learn & Practise Grammar (Beta)
• Word Lists home
• My Word Lists
• Recent additions
• Resources home
• Text Checker

Definition of assignation noun from the Oxford Advanced American Dictionary

assignation

Take your English to the next level

The Oxford Learner’s Thesaurus explains the difference between groups of similar words. Try it for free as part of the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary app

• Cambridge Dictionary +Plus

Meaning of assign in English

Your browser doesn't support HTML5 audio

assign verb [T] ( CHOOSE )

• Every available officer will be assigned to the investigation .
• The textbooks were assigned by the course director .
• Part of the group were assigned to clear land mines .
• Each trainee is assigned a mentor who will help them learn more about the job .
• We were assigned an interpreter for the duration of our stay .
• accommodate
• accommodate someone with something
• administration
• arm someone with something
• hand something down
• hand something in
• hand something out
• hand something over
• reassignment

You can also find related words, phrases, and synonyms in the topics:

assign verb [T] ( SEND )

• She was assigned to the Paris office .
• All the team were assigned to Poland.
• advertisement
• employment agency
• equality, diversity and inclusion
• reinstatement
• relocation expenses
• testimonial

assign verb [T] ( COMPUTING )

• 3-D printing
• adaptive learning
• additive manufacturing
• file sharing
• hexadecimal
• hill climbing
• home automation
• timesharing
• virtual reality

assign verb [T] ( GIVE LEGALLY )

Phrasal verb, assign | american dictionary, assign | business english, examples of assign, translations of assign.

Get a quick, free translation!

Word of the Day

a group of words in a fixed order that has a particular meaning that is different from the meanings of each word on its own

Flat out or at a snail’s pace? Talking about speed

Learn more with +Plus

• Recent and Recommended {{#preferredDictionaries}} {{name}} {{/preferredDictionaries}}
• Definitions Clear explanations of natural written and spoken English English Learner’s Dictionary Essential British English Essential American English
• Grammar and thesaurus Usage explanations of natural written and spoken English Grammar Thesaurus
• Pronunciation British and American pronunciations with audio English Pronunciation
• English–Chinese (Simplified) Chinese (Simplified)–English
• English–Chinese (Traditional) Chinese (Traditional)–English
• English–Dutch Dutch–English
• English–French French–English
• English–German German–English
• English–Indonesian Indonesian–English
• English–Italian Italian–English
• English–Japanese Japanese–English
• English–Norwegian Norwegian–English
• English–Polish Polish–English
• English–Portuguese Portuguese–English
• English–Spanish Spanish–English
• Dictionary +Plus Word Lists
• assign (CHOOSE)
• assign (SEND)
• assign (COMPUTING)
• assign (GIVE LEGALLY)
• American    Verb
• Business    Verb
• Translations
• All translations

Add assign to one of your lists below, or create a new one.

{{message}}

Something went wrong.

There was a problem sending your report.

• Subscriber Services
• For Authors
• Publications
• Archaeology
• Art & Architecture
• Bilingual dictionaries
• Classical studies
• Encyclopedias
• English Dictionaries and Thesauri
• Language reference
• Linguistics
• Media studies
• Medicine and health
• Names studies
• Performing arts
• Science and technology
• Social sciences
• Society and culture
• Overview Pages
• Subject Reference
• English Dictionaries
• Bilingual Dictionaries

Recently viewed (0)

• Save Search

Edited by: Jeremy Butterfield

• Find at OUP.com
• Google Preview

Related Content

In this work.

• Key to the Pronunciation
• Abbreviations and Symbols
• Bibliographical Abbreviations
• Publishing Information
• Some Quotations
• A revision for the twenty-first century
• Acknowledgements
• Dedication, 1926

assignment .  

The main meaning of assignment is now the originally American English one of a task or piece of work allotted to a person. In law it also denotes a legal transfer of a right or property, or the document that effects the transfer. To refer to the action of assigning something to someone, technically either ... ...

Access to the complete content on Oxford Reference requires a subscription or purchase. Public users are able to search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter without a subscription.

Please subscribe or login to access full text content.

If you have purchased a print title that contains an access token, please see the token for information about how to register your code.

For questions on access or troubleshooting, please check our FAQs , and if you can''t find the answer there, please contact us .

• Oxford University Press

PRINTED FROM OXFORD REFERENCE (www.oxfordreference.com). (c) Copyright Oxford University Press, 2023. All Rights Reserved. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a PDF of a single entry from a reference work in OR for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice ).

date: 27 September 2023

• Cookie Policy
• Privacy Policy
• Legal Notice
• Accessibility
• [66.249.64.20|185.126.86.119]
• 185.126.86.119

Character limit 500 /500

Definition of 'assign'

Video: pronunciation of assign

assign in British English

Assign in american english, examples of 'assign' in a sentence assign, cobuild collocations assign, trends of assign.

View usage for: All Years Last 10 years Last 50 years Last 100 years Last 300 years

In other languages assign

• American English : assign / əˈsaɪn /
• Brazilian Portuguese : delegar
• Chinese : 布置 任务
• European Spanish : asignar
• French : donner
• German : zuteilen
• Italian : assegnare
• Japanese : 割り当てる
• Korean : 할당하다
• European Portuguese : delegar
• Latin American Spanish : asignar
• Thai : มอบหมาย

Browse alphabetically assign

• assign a code
• assign a function
• assign a judge
• All ENGLISH words that begin with 'A'

Related terms of assign

• assign blame
• assign staff
• assign meaning
• assign seating
• View more related words

Quick word challenge

Quiz Review

Score: 0 / 5

Wordle Helper

Scrabble Tools

• More from M-W
• To save this word, you'll need to log in. Log In

Definition of assign

 (Entry 1 of 2)

transitive verb

Definition of assign  (Entry 2 of 2)

• intrust

ascribe , attribute , assign , impute , credit mean to lay something to the account of a person or thing.

ascribe suggests an inferring or conjecturing of cause, quality, authorship.

attribute suggests less tentativeness than ascribe , less definiteness than assign .

assign implies ascribing with certainty or after deliberation.

impute suggests ascribing something that brings discredit by way of accusation or blame.

credit implies ascribing a thing or especially an action to a person or other thing as its agent, source, or explanation.

Examples of assign in a Sentence

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'assign.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Verb and Noun

Middle English, from Anglo-French assigner , from Latin assignare , from ad- + signare to mark, from signum mark, sign

13th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

15th century, in the meaning defined above

Phrases Containing assign

• pre - assign

Dictionary Entries Near assign

Cite this entry.

“Assign.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/assign. Accessed 27 Sep. 2023.

Kids Definition

Kids definition of assign, legal definition, legal definition of assign.

Legal Definition of assign  (Entry 2 of 2)

More from Merriam-Webster on assign

Nglish: Translation of assign for Spanish Speakers

Britannica English: Translation of assign for Arabic Speakers

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!

Can you solve 4 words at once?

Word of the day.

See Definitions and Examples »

Get Word of the Day daily email!

Stack Exchange Network

Stack Exchange network consists of 183 Q&A communities including Stack Overflow , the largest, most trusted online community for developers to learn, share their knowledge, and build their careers.

English Language Learners Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for speakers of other languages learning English. It only takes a minute to sign up.

Q&A for work

Connect and share knowledge within a single location that is structured and easy to search.

Assign someone to/in a city/country

Let's say an employee was assigned to work in a particular district/city/country etc. Can we say that person was assigned "to" or "in" there? In the Oxford Dictionary, the definition of the usage I want to use is "to send a person to work under the authority of somebody or in a particular group". But my question is not about working in a group but working in a place like a city, country etc. where my workplace/army base etc. is. Let's say I am a public school teacher and I was sent to work at a school in a city or country called "XYZ", or maybe a neighborhood called "XYZ". Can I say either of these two sentences interchangeably?

I was assigned in XYZ.

I was assigned to XYZ.

Some other example sentences: *"I was assigned in/to Los Angeles", "I was assigned in/to Nigeria", "I was assigned in/to the Valley Neighborhood"

Are these okay with either "to" or "in", or do I have to specify the workplace instead of specifying where the work place is when I use "assign"?

• word-choice
• word-meaning
• idiomatic-language
• prepositional-verbs

• 3 Assign is usually followed with to . –  Kate Bunting Oct 13, 2021 at 7:34
• assigned in a place means that is where a person assigned you to another one to work. –  Lambie Oct 25, 2021 at 15:04
• @Lambie I don't understand what you mean, sorry. Can you explain more clearly? –  Fire and Ice Oct 26, 2021 at 15:14
• "I was assigned to the position [when I was] in Los Angeles ". Oh really? "I was assigned in Las Vegas, not LA." –  Lambie Oct 26, 2021 at 16:21
• @Lambie What do you think about appoint in/at ? Should we use "He was appointed to Los Angeles" instead of **"He was appointed in Los Angeles"? I probably should open another topic on "appoint." –  Fire and Ice Oct 27, 2021 at 6:42

No , "assigned in" and "assigned to" are not interchangeable. "Assigned to" is idiomatic and "assigned in" is not.

As you say, when describing what you were assigned, you use the preposition to :

In Nigeria, I was assigned to the water-supply project.

And when describing where you were assigned, you also use to :

When I joined the Peace Corps I was assigned to Nigeria.

If it helps, you can think of it as being a sort of shortening of "assigned to working in Nigeria ," with "working in Nigeria" describing what you were assigned to do rather than where you were assigned to do it.

It is also possible to omit the preposition and say you were simply assigned [noun]:

I was assigned mess-hall duty.

In this usage the noun is often "duty," "patrol," etc, but it can be just about anything: "I was assigned sweeping" is perfectly valid, though you could say "sweeping duty " as well.

As Lambie points out in the comments, if you really really want to do it, it is technically possible to use assigned in to specify the place where you were at the time you received the assignment :

I was assigned in New York to Nigeria.

But this is awkward and confusing phrasing, and rewriting it would be better:

In New York, I was assigned to Nigeria. I was assigned to Nigeria when I got to New York.

Appoint works exactly the same as I have described assign above.

• Can we just use "assign somebody" instead of "assign somebody to/as somebody" or "assign somebody to do something". For example like, "A new teacher was assigned." Do we have to specify what he/she was assigned to? According to Oxford, we can omit that, but other dictionaries don't mention that. –  Fire and Ice Oct 26, 2021 at 9:32
• 2 That can work if there is sufficient context. For example: "We started the school year with Mrs. Smith, but a new teacher was assigned in October." Although "we were assigned a new teacher in October" sounds better. –  randomhead Oct 26, 2021 at 15:37
• 1 "A teacher was assigned" is a very passive passive-voice clause; it doesn't say who assigned the teacher, nor what (or where) the teacher was assigned (you have to go back to the first part of the sentence for context). This is the kind of passive voice people talk about when they say that the passive voice should be avoided—it allows for twisted constructions like "A bullet was fired from the policeman's gun and a bystander was killed." In contrast, "We were assigned a teacher" is still passive voice, but there is more context bundled into the clause and it sounds less awkward. –  randomhead Oct 26, 2021 at 16:29
• 1 Thanks. I have the same questions about "appoint," but I need to open another topic I guess. –  Fire and Ice Oct 27, 2021 at 6:58
• 1 I was assigned in Los Angeles to New York. I was not assigned to New York in Las Vegas. I strove mightily to explain that and was rebuffed. :) Appoint or assign work exactly the same way. –  Lambie Oct 27, 2021 at 17:05

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for browse other questions tagged word-usage word-choice word-meaning idiomatic-language prepositional-verbs ..

• Featured on Meta
• Alpha test for short survey in banner ad slots starting on week of September...
• If more users could vote, would they engage more? Testing 1 reputation voting...
• Sunsetting Winter/Summer Bash: Rationale and Next Steps

Hot Network Questions

• What is the current through the resistor?
• When was the end of the floppy-only IBM PC clone?
• Space-ships and stations...made from cast-iron?
• Is it illegal to have a product delivered to a different ZIP code to pay less sales tax?
• kula devi/devata of Shree Rama?
• Is there a term of art for a quick location-identifier interstitial scene before cutting to the action?
• Feeling of falling during turbulence
• Resolve a "the eggs take longer than the pizza" issue?
• How can Ural Airlines fly an A320 from an unpaved field after an emergency landing?
• Iterate through a list argument in Lilypond define-scheme-function
• Where is this image of Vader from?
• How to identify constraints that make problem not solvable in polynomial time?
• A Trivial Pursuit #12 (Sports and Leisure 2/4): Logic Boat
• My Medieval kingdom has birth control, why is the population so high?
• Lawn: Newly sown turf grows at least twice as fast as the "old" turf
• How is the Cosmic Microwave Background so big?
• Trouble identifying the subject in a long sentence
• What's the most recent version of AmigaOS?
• Possible to mix garbage collection and manual memory management?
• How can I properly translate possessive form of nouns?
• Convert ln(mm^2) to linear cm^2
• What are some factually incorrect quantitative finance answers generated by AI?
• why use template in year_month class?
• Can “hydrates” of crystals form with other molecules?

Your privacy

By clicking “Accept all cookies”, you agree Stack Exchange can store cookies on your device and disclose information in accordance with our Cookie Policy .