characterize

characterize, distinguish, mark, qualify are comparable when they mean to be a peculiar or significant quality or feature of something.

Characterize stresses that quality or feature (or those qualities or features) which stands out and identifies the person or thing considered; often an obvious or striking feature rather than a fundamental or basic quality is implied

{

metaphor characterizes the language of poetry— R. M. Weaver

}

{

that mien of assured authority, of capacity tested in many a crisis, which characterized Mrs. Baines— Bennett

}

Distinguish (see also DISTINGUISH), on the other hand, stresses a feature, a quality, or a characteristic that makes a person or thing different from others or that sets him or it apart from and sometimes above others

{

a peculiar sort of sweet pudding . . . distinguished the days of his coming— Lamb

}

{

was distinguished for ignorance; for he had only one idea, and that was wrong— Disraeli

}

{

once writers were a class apart, distinguished by ink-stained fingers, unkempt hair, and a predilection for drinking cheap wine in cellars— Uhlan

}

Mark (see also MARK vb) implies the presence of noteworthy qualities or features that are the outward signs of an inward character

{

no triumph—no exaltation . . . marks her manner— Cowden Clarke

}

{

are we so sure that the qualities that mark successful climbers—self-assertion, acquisition, emulation—are highly desirable?— Ellis

}

Qualify (see also PREPARE, MODERATE) occasionally implies a quality, characteristic, or description that is attributed by the immediate writer or speaker to a person or thing as fitted to him or it

{

the "Devil's drawing room," as some have qualified that wondrous place— Byron

}

{

cannot qualify it as . . . either glad or sorry— T. S. Eliot

}

Analogous words: *distinguish, differentiate, demarcate: individualize, peculiarize (see corresponding adjectives at CHAR-ACTERISTIC)