- part#
- part n Part, portion, piece, detail, member, division, section, segment, sector, fraction, fragment, parcel are comparable when they mean something which is less than the whole but which actually is or is considered as if apart from the rest of the whole.Part is the most comprehensive of these terms; it may be used in place of any of the succeeding words in this group or even in place of such words as element, component, or constituent (see ELEMENT){
all are but parts of one stupendous whole— Pope
}{he spent part of his life in China
}{a large part of the estate went to the elder son
}{the cup was broken into three parts
}{the better part of valor is discretion— Shak.
}{its basic assumption is that the social whole has greater worth and significance than its individual parts— Huxley
}Portion, although it denotes a part of a whole, does not always presuppose a compact or integral whole; it may suggest a whole that comprises all of an existing or a possible stock or store without any connotation of its assemblage{he is a portion of the loveliness which once he made more lovely— Shelley
}{she dreaded . . . taking from the small sum of peace they had in the world, adding to the portion of their unhappiness— Malamud
}But portion (see also FATE) is preferred to part when there is the intent to imply determination of amount or quantity or assignment or allotment, especially of a share{divide a pie into six equal portions
}{a portion of each day was given to this artistic labor— Hudson
}{when the plant was set, a portion of water, nicely calculated as to quantity, ran down a pipe and was deposited at the plant roots— Anderson
}Piece applies to a separate or detached part or portion of a whole; thus, a piece of bread is a part of a larger whole such as a loaf; a piece of cloth may be a length cut from a bolt, a smaller length left after the larger part of that piece has been used, or a bit that serves as a swatch or sample{break a stick of candy into pieces
}{ask for a small piece of the cake
}But piece so stresses the implication of independence that the term may come close to item and then is often applied to a thing that is relatively complete in itself, and has reference to a whole only as it presupposes a mass from which it was taken, a collection of similar or related things, especially as produced by one person, one machine, or one factory{the red-hot piece of iron upon the blacksmith's anvil
}{each piece of furniture has been freshly polished
}{a piece of poetry
}{she had learned . . . that there really was more than one man in the world—the piece of knowledge that more than anything else divides women from giris— Wouk
}Detail (see also ITEM) applies to a part chiefly when the presupposed whole is a plan or design, or represents the working out of a plan or design; in this sense the term is used largely in the arts of painting, sculpture, and architecture, and often denotes a small but important part or feature{reproduce a detail of a painting
}{the sculptor's students were set to work, each modeling a detail of the Venus de Milo
}{this blueprint shows the details of the façade
}{she had her plan clearly in her head, with every detail as distinct as though the scheme had already been carried through— Gibbons
}Member applies to a part that constitutes one of the units of which a body (as a human or animal body, a social or legislative body, or a constructed or manufactured body) is comprised; the term, though it usually implies close association with the body under consideration, also usually implies separability of the unit in thought or in fact{the legs, arms, and head are often specifically regarded as members of the human body
}{the saddle seat is a distinctive member of a Windsor chair
}{the flying buttress is an important architectural member of most of the great medieval Gothic cathedrals
}{members of Congress
}{the club has 500 members
}{a lolling, impudent tongue—a truly unruly member— Banfield
}{society is a joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater— Emerson
}Division and section apply to a distinct, often a detached, part formed by or as if by cutting or dividing. The terms are often used interchangeably, but division is usually applied to larger parts than is section; thus, one would refer to the divisions of modern languages and of political sciences of a college but to the several sections into which a large class of students taking a course is divided{there are twenty sections of freshman English
}Except in technical use, the terms carry no explicit suggestions as to size or extent; division, however, is more often used abstractly than section, which tends to be applied to a conspicuously distinct part (as of a writing, a people, a country, a territory, or a city){it is improper to speak of these different parts of the chemical industry as divisions, for the solidarity of the whole does not permit splitting it— Morrison
}{the only important grape-growing section of Pennsylvania— Amer. Guide Series: Pa.
}{the sports section of the newspaper
}{entertained by all sections of the local community— Moir
}Segment is often preferred to section for a part cut off by natural lines of cleavage or necessitated by the nature of the thing's construction or design{a segment of an orange
}{a segment of a compound leaf
}{invited to address a segment of the war college— Michener
}{essential raw materials for a broad segment of American industry— Crops in Peace and War
}In mathematical use segment is distinguished from sector in that segment refers to any part of a plane or solid figure cut off from the whole by a line or plane{a segment of a cylinder
}{a segment of a circle is bounded by an arc and a chord
}while sector refers to any part of a circle bounded by an arc and two radii{divide a circle into six sectors
}In more general use sector applies to a section that roughly corresponds to a mathematical sector; thus, a sector assigned to a commander of a division in war has arbitrary bounds on sides and rear but a front that is as extensive as the range of its guns{consider the . . . problem as a whole and not in sectors— Vandenberg
}Fraction and fragment both apply to a part that is disconnected from a whole, especially by breaking; but fraction, probably by its confusion with the arithmetical sense of that word, often suggests a negligible part{only a small fraction of mankind is capable of enthusiasm for language, for its own sake— Inge
}{some little fraction . .. of your enjoyment of tragedy— Montague
}and fragment applies to a random bit and especially to one of the pieces left after most of the whole has been eaten, used, worn away, or lost{they took up of the fragments . . . twelve baskets full—Mr 14:20
}{only a fragment of the dramatic literature that once existed— Altick
}{if the novel proves to be a novel and not a collage of extraordinary fragments— Mailer
}Parcel (see also BUNDLE) is used chiefly in law with reference to land and in such idiomatic phrases as part and parcel; in all its uses it carries an underlying notion of a part having a firm and unbreakable connection with the whole to which it belongs{and I will die a hundred thousand deaths ere break the smallest parcel of this vow— Shak.
}{a land parcel, insofar as it is a described area on the face of the earth, cannot be destroyed— Babcock
}Antonyms: wholepart vb divide, *separate, sever, sunder, divorceAntonyms: cleave (see STICK)
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.