pause

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give (one) pause

To cause one to take a moment to consider something; to cause one to hesitate. I'd love to buy a house, but the fact that I'd have to completely deplete my savings account to do it gives me pause. That statistic should give everyone pause.

See also: give, pause

give (one) pause for thought

To cause one to take a moment to consider something. I'd love to buy a house, but the fact that I'd have to completely deplete my savings account to do it gives me pause for thought.

give pause to (one)

To cause one to take a moment to consider something. I'd love to buy a house, but the fact that I'd have to completely deplete my savings account to do it gives pause to me.

See also: give, pause

a pregnant silence

An overly long pause in speech that indicates a lot of meaning or significance. She gave a pregnant silence just before announcing the winner to build dramatic tension. While recounting his story, Jake gave a pregnant silence before naming the person who committed the crime, leading me to wonder whether he was telling the truth.

a pregnant pause

An overly long pause in speech that indicates a lot of meaning or significance. She gave a pregnant pause just before announcing the winner to build dramatic tension. While recounting his story, Jake gave a pregnant pause before naming the person who committed the crime, leading me to wonder whether he was telling the truth.

give someone pause (for thought)

Fig. to cause someone to stop and think. When I see a golden sunrise, it gives me pause for thought. Witnessing an accident is likely to give all of us pause.

See also: give, pause

give pause

Cause one to hesitate, as in The high monthly installment payments gave me pause, or, as Shakespeare put it in Hamlet (3:1): "For in that sleep of death what dreams may come ... Must give us pause." [c. 1600]

See also: give, pause

give pause to someone (or give someone pause (for thought)

cause someone to think carefully or hesitate before doing something.

a pregnant pause (or silence)

a pause or silence that is laden with meaning or significance.

give (somebody) pause for ˈthought

give (somebody) ˈpause

(formal) make somebody think seriously about something or hesitate before doing something: His remarks on the conditions in our prisons gave me pause for thought. Until that moment I’d never realized things were so bad.

a pregnant ˈpause/ˈsilence

a pause/silence in which everyone is waiting or listening for something, or a moment of silence which is full of meaning: There was a pregnant pause while everyone waited to hear what she had to say.

See also: pause, pregnant, silence

References in periodicals archive ?

Skates often bent themselves defensively into a ring or ball, which caused them to land upside down during winnowing, but in calm conditions, they could be active in seeking escape and 25 skates did so during one monitored 15-min pause.

REDUCING DISCARDS OF FLATFISH IN THE SEA SCALLOP DREDGE FISHERY BY DREDGE PAUSE

Standardized global pause frequency = (Raw global pause frequency/ event time (seconds)) * 3600 (seconds) Interval analysis of pauses

Analyzing Pauses in Computer-Assisted EFL Writing--A Computer Keystroke-Log Perspective

The big idea behind the pause is to create a sacred space for you, a place free of all distractions.

Just be: eliminate distractions and master "the pause" in the age of anxiety

We also use the pause to let our listeners enjoy the laughter to its fullest.

THE USE OF TIMING TO MAKE YOUR HUMOR CONNECT

Dujarric said, "We continue to reiterate our call for a humanitarian pause, unconditional humanitarian pause, and I would say that the Secretary-General reminds all parties in the conflict in Yemen, from both inside and outside of the country of their obligations under international human rights and humanitarian law, and calls on all sides to prevent further deterioration of the unfolding humanitarian catastrophe that we are seeing in Yemen.

Humanitarian pause did not take hold over the weekend in Yemen, UN

special envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed that the pause would be fully respected with no violations from any combatants under their control.

New Al-Qaeda leader in Yemen urges attacks on United States

Despite the lack of understanding as to what motivates a specific pause during text production, researchers have adopted pauses as an indicator of cognitive effort in translation as well.

On the operationalisation of 'pauses' in translation process research

the annual Pause for Hope service on Sunday, October 5.

/ POEMS are being sought for the annual

-Serbian central bank expected to pause rate increases

Simultaneous starts after pause (defined as both speakers initiating speech in less than 200 ms of each other) are relatively rare in our Finnish corpus as well: Approximately 6% of pauses ended in simultaneous starts (cf.

Modeling turn-taking rhythms with oscillators

I OFTEN wish I could pause and rewind when I'm listening to the radio, like I can with my TV digibox.

Can I pause and rewind live radio? TRICKS of the TRADE

TOKYO - Tokyo stocks rose Wednesday, aided by solid Chinese economic data and a pause in the yen's advance after the Japanese currency rose sharply early in the morning.

Kyodo news summary -6-

HOVE trainer John Gammon will not rush kennel stars Judicial Pause and Spinkys Nod back into action despite both pleasing in sprint trials at the Sussex track yesterday.

Gammon star Judicial has Wimbledon target

Findings of this research suggest that overall pauses in preceding position were measured to be considerably longer than in following position, and grammar/lexical categorization did not have a significant effect on pause length, while calculations made in terms of phonological analysis yielded rather intriguing results in that in places where there was linking between the last sound of the preceding word and the beginning sound of the preposition and no linking in the following position, pauses measured with no statistically significant differences, whereas in all other linking situations, differences were in line with the total pause length in both positions.

Pausing preceding and following prepositions in prepositional phrases of Obama's inaugural speech

Slichter describes mixing "Closing Time," the band's 1998 mega-hit, with Bob Clearmountain, who inserted a pause before the final chorus--a move so characteristic of his mixes that the pauses are known as "Clearmountain pauses.