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Dictionary

Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.

theorize en · VERB

Pronunciation

  • /ˈθɪə.ɹɑɪz/ (General-Australian)
  • /ˈθiː.ə.ɹɑɪz/ (General-Australian)
  • /ˈθɪɹ.aɪz/ (Received-Pronunciation)
  • /ˈθiː.ə.ɹaɪz/ (Received-Pronunciation)
  • /ˈθɪə.ɹaɪz/ (Received-Pronunciation)
  • (Southern-England) audio
  • /ˈθɪɹ.ɑɪz/ (General-Australian)
  • /ˈθi.ə.ɹaɪz/ (General-American)
  • /ˈθɪɹ.aɪz/ (General-American)

Etymology

From theory + -ize. First use appears c. 1599 in the text A pil to purge melancholie.

Meanings

  1. (intransitive) To formulate a theory, especially about some specific subject.
    • Autistic rhetoric scholar Melanie Yergeau theorizes neuroqueer as a kind of “asocially perverse” motioning. 2021, Ryan Lee Cartwright, Peculiar Places: A Queer Crip History of White Rural Nonconformity, University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, page 188:
    • There are processes of collective individuation that produce the transindividual in the course of a process of transindividuation (which Simondon does not theorize as such). 2018, Bernard Stiegler, Automatic Society: The Future of Work, page 152:
    • Derridean "messianicity without messianism" that marks so much of post-modernist educational theorizing today, and that makes use of esotericism, sigetics, acroamatics, proleptics, and illocutionary and perlocutionary acts in the disguise of a new pedagogy of the unknowable, wasn't the answer ten years ago. 2002, Dave Hill, Marxism Against Postmodernism in Educational Theory, page 257:
    • The homeowner theorized that the intruders saw that the house was up for sale and targeted it for their rager. 2022 June 22, Selim Algar, “Incensed owner of $8M Florida mansion ransacked by teens wants them prosecuted”, in New York Post, New York, N.Y.: News Corp, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 03 Jul 2022:
  2. (intransitive) To speculate.

Forms

SpellingFeaturesLabelsSource
theorise UK, alternative lexicographic
theorized Tense=Past, VerbForm=Part lexicographic
theorized Tense=Past lexicographic
theorizes Number=Sing, Person=3, Tense=Pres lexicographic
theorizing Tense=Pres, VerbForm=Part lexicographic

Deriveds

untheorized · mistheorize · undertheorized · overtheorize · theorizable · retheorize · undertheorize · theorizer · conspiracy theorize

Translations (23)

fr théoriser (formulate theories) · grc θεωρέω (formulate theories) · kk теорияландыру (formulate theories) · cy damcaniaethu (formulate theories) · io spekular (formulate theories) · ca teoritzar (formulate theories) · it teorizzare (formulate theories) · kk теория тұрғысынан тексеру (formulate theories) · kk теория жасау (formulate theories) · cy damcanu (formulate theories) · da teoretisere (formulate theories) · mr सिद्धांत मांडणे (formulate theories) · io teoriifar (formulate theories) · pt teorizar (formulate theories) · sv teoretisera (formulate theories) · hu elméletbe foglal (formulate theories) · mr उपपत्ती लावणे (formulate theories) · eo teorii (formulate theories) · ru теоретизировать (formulate theories) · gl teorizar (formulate theories) · fi teorioida (formulate theories) · es teorizar (formulate theories) · fi teoretisoida (formulate theories)