- type
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Analogous words: *sign, mark, token: intimation, suggestion (see corresponding verbs at SUGGEST 1): adumbration, shadowing (see corresponding verbs at SUGGEST 2)Antonyms: antitype2 Type, kind, sort, stripe, kidney, ilk, description, nature, character are comparable when they denote a number of individuals thought of as a group or class because of one or more shared and distinctive characteristics.Type may suggest strong, clearly marked, or obvious similarities throughout the items included so that the distinctiveness of the group that they form cannot be overlooked{
the landforms are related to these rock types— True man
}{that most dangerous type of critic: the critic with a mind which is naturally of the creative order— T. S. Eliot
}Kind in most uses is likely to be very indefinite and involve any criterion of classification whatever{each kind of mental or bodily activity— Spencer
}{their soil yields treasures of every kind— Buckle
}{the kind of fear here treated of is purely spiritual— Lamb
}but it may suggest criteria of grouping dependent natural, intrinsic characteristics{Sinic philosophers conceived yin and yang as two different kinds of matter ... yin symbolized water and yang fire— Toynbee
}Sort is often a close synonym of kind{the sort of culture I am trying to define— Powys
}and may be used in situations having a suggestion of disparagement{the sort of journals put out by the learned societies— New Republic
}{Victorianism of a meaner and baser sort— Milieu
}{what sort of idiots have you got around here?— Long
}Type, kind, and sort are usually interchangeable and are used most of the time without attention to special connotations. Stripe and kidney are used mostly of people rather than things; the first may suggest political attitude or affiliation, the second persuasion, disposition, or social level{all Fascists are not of one mind, one stripe— Hellman
}{economic dogmatists of whatever stripe— Atlantic
}{the crown representative and comptroller, were political appointees; and like many men of that kidney had never done a fair share of the work— Morison
}Ilk may suggest grouping on the basis of status, attitude, or temperament{no matter if . . . your ancestors spoke only to Cabots and their ilk— Walker
}{one great composer is worth twenty of your ilk— Bella & Samuel Spewack
}Description, nature, and character are close synonyms of type and kind mostly in phrases beginning with of.Description may suggest a grouping in which all salient details of description or definition are involved; nature may suggest inherent, essential characteristics rather than superficial, ostensible, or tentative ones; and character may stress distinctive or individualizing criteria{all embargoes are not of this description. They are sometimes resorted to . . . with a single view to commerce— John Marshall
}{the few hitherto known phenomena of a similar nature—Amer. Jour, of Science
}{until the invention of printing advertising was necessarily of this primitive character— Presbrey
}Analogous words: exemplar, example, *model, pattern
New Dictionary of Synonyms. 2014.
