- repeat
- repeat vb 1 Repeat, iterate, reiterate, ingeminate can all mean to say again.Repeat, the word in ordinary use, may apply to what is said or uttered or done again, whether once or many or an indefinite number of times{
repeat a command
}{the teacher repeated her question not once but three times
}{wondered what would have happened if he had repeated his earlier tantrum— Purdy
}{repeat an attempt to swim the river
}{repeat a step in a process
}{wish to repeat a pleasant experience
}Repeat sometimes implies a change in the speaker or doer{please do not repeat what I have told you
}{the teacher asked the children to repeat the verses after her
}{falsehoods and half- truths . . . uncritically repeated from writer to writer— Altick
}Iterate usually implies one repetition after another, especially of something that is said{the bird in the dusk iterating, iterating, his one phrase— Aiken
}There is very little difference between iterate and reiterate, except that iterate occasionally refers to a second saying or uttering or sometimes doing and reiterate carries an even more emphatic implication of manifold repetitions; consequently the two words are often used together when insistency is implied{scientific research iterates and reiterates one moral ... the greatness of little things— Sat. Review (London)
}When only one term is desired to make this point, reiterate is especially appropriate{over and over again, in a somber, bullfrog voice, he reiterates his favorite theme— Armbrister
}Ingeminate, a somewhat uncommon term, implies reiteration for special emphasis or impressiveness. It therefore seldom implies indefinite repetition but rather duplication or triplication for the sake of the effect produced{that peace-loving habit of mind . . . which made so many nations, in the years before 1939, ingeminate "Peace" when there was no peace— Ernest Barker
}{"He was the tramp," he ingeminated. "He was the tramp."— Buchan
}2 *quote, cite
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
