or instance of cutting.
- n. A cross-section (image that shows an object as if cut along a plane).
- n. An incision or the act of making an incision.
- n. A thin slice of material prepared as a specimen for research.
- n. A group of 10-15 soldiers lead by a non-commissioned officer and forming part of a platoon.
- n. A right inverse.
- n. A piece of residential land usually a quarter of an acre, a plot.
- v. To cut, divide or separate into pieces.
- v. To commit, as for mental health reasons. So called after various sections of legal acts regarding mental health.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English
- n. The act of cutting, or separation by cutting.
- n. A part separated from something; a division; a portion; a slice.
- n. A distinct part or portion of a book or writing; a subdivision of a chapter; the division of a law or other writing; a paragraph; an article; hence, the character §, often used to denote such a division.
- n. A distinct part of a country or people, community, class, or the like; a part of a territory separated by geographical lines, or of a people considered as distinct.
- n. One of the portions, of one square mile each, into which the public lands of the United States are divided; one thirty-sixth part of a township. These sections are subdivided into quarter sections for sale under the homestead and preëmption laws.
- n. The figure made up of all the points common to a superficies and a solid which meet, or to two superficies which meet, or to two lines which meet. In the first case the section is a superficies, in the second a line, and in the third a point.
- n. A division of a genus; a group of species separated by some distinction from others of the same genus; -- often indicated by the sign §.
- n. A part of a musical period, composed of one or more phrases. See Phrase.
- n. The description or representation of anything as it would appear if cut through by any intersecting plane; depiction of what is beyond a plane passing through, or supposed to pass through, an object, as a building, a machine, a succession of strata; profile.
from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. The act of cutting or dividing; separation by cutting: as, the section of one plane by another.
- n. A part cut or separated, or regarded as separated, from the rest; a division; a portion.
- n. One of the squares, each containing 640 acres, into which the public lands of the United States are divided; the thirty-sixth part of a township.
- n. A certain proportion of a battalion or company told off for military movements and evolutions.
- n. In mech., any part of a machine that can be readily detached from the other parts, as one of the knives of a mower.
- n. A division in a sleeping-car, including two seats facing each other, and designed to be made into two sleeping-berths. A double section takes in four seats, two on each side of the car.
- n. In bookbinding, the leaves of an intended book that are folded together to make one gathering and to prepare them for sewing.
- n. In printing, that part of a printed sheet of book-work which has to be cut off from the full sheet and separately folded and sewed. On paper of ordinary thickness, the section is usually of eight leaves or sixteen pages; on thick paper, the section is often of four leaves or eight pages.
- n. The curve of intersection of two surfaces.
- n. A representation of an object as it would appear if cut by any intersecting plane, showing the internal structure; a diagram or picture showing what would appear were a part cut off by a plane supposed to pass through an object, as a building, a machine, a biological structure, or a succession of strata.
- n. A thin slice of an organic or inorganic substance cut off, as for microscopic examination.
- n. In zoology, a classificatory group of no fixed grade or taxonomic rank; a division, series, or group of animals: used, like group, differently by different authors.
- n. In botany, a group of species subordinate to a genus: nearly the same as subgenus (which see).
- n. In forti