Relating

Part of speech: verb

Pronunciation: /ɹɪˈleɪtɪŋ/

Definitions

1. Concerning the connection or association between various entities
2. Pertaining to the links or relevance between different objects or ideas
3. Involving the relationship or correlation between various subjects or concepts

Etymology: "Relating" is the present participle of "relate," and the verb carries its sense of "carrying back" from Latin "referō," which combined "re-" (back) with "ferre" (to carry). The Latin past participle "relātus" gave English "relate," and English also took the same root through French as "refer," making the two a doublet: one word entered from Latin, the other through the French route. Their shared ancestor literally meant to bring something back, so to relate two things is to carry one back toward the other. The sense of "telling" came first. In Latin, "referre" could mean to report or recount, so "relate" in English originally meant to narrate or tell a story, and only later came to mean establishing a link between things. That shift from recounting to connecting explains why the modern "showing connection" sense feels abstract compared with the physical carrying behind it.

Synonyms: connecting, linking, associating, correlating, referring

Antonyms: disconnecting, isolating, separating, dismissing, ignoring