business

English

English Wikipedia has an article on:

business

Wikipedia

Alternative forms

• bisoness, businesse, busynesse (obsolete)
• bidness (pronunciation spelling, AAVE)

Etymology

From Middle English busines, busynes, businesse, bisynes, from Old English bisiġnes (“business, busyness”), equivalent to busy +‎ -ness. Doublet of busyness.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbɪz.nɪs/, /ˈbɪz.nɪz/
• (weak vowel merger) IPA^(key): /ˈbɪz.nəs/, /ˈbɪz.nəz/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• (Southern American English) IPA^(key): /ˈbɪd.nəs/, /ˈbɪd.nəz/
• Hyphenation: busi‧ness
• Rhymes: -ɪznɪs, -ɪznɪz, -ɪznəs, -ɪznəz, -ɪdnəs, -ɪdnəz

Noun

business (countable and uncountable, plural businesses)

1. (countable) A specific commercial enterprise or establishment.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:enterprise

   I left my father's business.

   • 2013 June 22, “T time”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 68:

     The ability to shift profits to low-tax countries by locating intellectual property in them, which is then licensed to related businesses in high-tax countries, is often assumed to be the preserve of high-tech companies.

2. (countable) A person's occupation, work, or trade.

   He is in the motor and insurance businesses.

   I'm going to Las Vegas on business.

3. (uncountable) Commercial, industrial, or professional activity.

   He's such a poor cook, I can't believe he's still in business!

   We do business all over the world.

4. (uncountable) The volume or amount of commercial trade.

   Business has been slow lately.

   They did nearly a million dollars of business over the long weekend.

   • 2013 May 25, “No hiding place”, in The Economist‎, volume 407, number 8837, page 74:

     In America alone, people spent $170 billion on “direct marketing”—junk mail of both the physical and electronic varieties—last year. Yet of those who received unsolicited adverts through the post, only 3% bought anything as a result. If the bumf arrived electronically, the take-up rate was 0.1%. And for online adverts the “conversion” into sales was a minuscule 0.01%. That means about $165 billion was spent not on drumming up business, but on annoying people, creating landfill and cluttering spam filters.

5. (uncountable) One's dealings; patronage.

   I shall take my business elsewhere.

6. (uncountable) Private commercial interests taken collectively.

   This proposal will satisfy both business and labor.

   • 2013 August 10, Schumpeter, “Cronies and capitols”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848:

     Policing the relationship between government and business in a free society is difficult. Businesspeople have every right to lobby governments, and civil servants to take jobs in the private sector.

7. (uncountable) The management of commercial enterprises, or the study of such management.

   I studied business at Harvard.

8. (countable) A particular situation or activity.

   This UFO stuff is a mighty strange business.

   • , John Heywood, The Playe Called The Foure PP , London: Wyllyam Myddylton, →OCLC; reprinted as John S. Farmer, editor, The Play Called The Four PP  (The Tudor Facsimile Texts), London; Edinburgh: T. C. & E. C. Jack, , 1908, →OCLC, signature [E.ii.], verso:

     The wolde ſome mayſter perhappes clowt ye / But as for me ye nede nat doute ye / For I had leuer be without ye / Then haue ſuche beſyneſſe aboute ye.

9. (countable) Any activity or objective needing to be dealt with; especially, one of a financial or legal matter.

   Our principal business here is to get drunk.

   Let's get down to business.

   • 1651, Thomas Hobbes, “Chapter I: Of Sense”, in Leviathan‎^Wikisource:

     To know the naturall cause of Sense, is not very necessary to the business now in hand; and I have els-where written of the same at large.

10. (uncountable) Something involving one personally.

    That's none of your business.

11. (uncountable, parliamentary procedure) Matters that come before a body for deliberation or action.

    If that concludes the announcements, we'll move on to new business.

12. (travel, uncountable) Business class, the class of seating provided by airlines between first class and coach.
    • 1992, James Wallace, Jim Erickson, Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire‎, page 154:

      Gates, who always flew business or coach, didn't particularly like the high air fares Nishi was charging to Microsoft, […]

13. (acting) Action carried out with a prop or piece of clothing, usually away from the focus of the scene.
    • 1983, Peter Thomson, Shakespeare's Theatre‎, →ISBN, page 155:

      The business with the hat is a fine example of the difficulty of distinguishing between 'natural' and 'formal' acting.

14. (countable, rare) The collective noun for a group of ferrets.

    Synonym: fesnyng

    • 2004, Dave Duncan, The Jaguar Knights: A Chronicle of the King's Blades‎, →ISBN, page 252:

      I'm sure his goons will go through the ship like a business of ferrets, and they'll want to look in our baggage.

15. (slang, British) Something very good; top quality. (possibly from "the bee's knees")

    These new phones are the business!

16. (slang, uncountable) The act of defecation, or the excrement itself, particularly that of a non-human animal.

    Your ferret left his business all over the floor.

    As the cart went by, its horse lifted its tail and did its business.

17. (slang) Disruptive shenanigans.

    I haven't seen cartoons giving someone the business since the 1990s.

18. (Australian Aboriginal) matters (e.g sorry business = a funeral)

Derived terms

Related terms

• pidgin

Descendants

Translations

Adjective

business

1. Of, to, pertaining to, or used for purposes of conducting trade, commerce, governance, advocacy or other professional purposes.

   Please do not use this phone for personal calls; it is a business phone.

   • 1897, Reform Club (New York, N.Y.) Sound Currency Committee, Sound Currency‎, volumes 4-5, page cclii:

     They are solely business instruments. Every man's relation to them is purely a business relation. His use of them is purely a business use.

   • 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 10, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC:

     With a little manœuvring they contrived to meet on the doorstep which was […] in a boiling stream of passers-by, hurrying business people speeding past in a flurry of fumes and dust in the bright haze.

   • 1996, Lawyers Co-operative Publishing Company, American Law Reports: Annotations and Cases‎, volume 35, page 432:

     […] the fact that the injured party came to the insured premises for solely business purposes precluded any reliance on the non-business pursuits exception (§ 1 1 2[b]).

   • 2003, Marvin Snider, Compatibility Breeds Success: How to Manage Your Relationship with Your Business Partner‎, page 298:

     Both of these partnerships have to cope with these dual issues in a more complicated way than is the case in solely business partnerships.

2. Professional, businesslike, having concern for good business practice.
   • 1889, The Clothier and furnisher‎, volume 19, page 38:

     He is thoroughly business, but has the happy faculty of transacting it in a genial and courteous manner.

   • 1909, Business Administration: Business Practice‎, La Salle Extension University, page 77:

     […] and the transaction carried through in a thoroughly business manner.

   • 1927, “Making of America Project”, in Harper's Magazine‎, volume 154, page 502:

     Sometimes this very subtle contrast becomes only too visible, as when in wartime Jewish business men were almost lynched because they were thoroughly business men and worked for profit.

   • 2009, Frank Channing Haddock, Business Power: Supreme Business Laws and Maxims that Win Wealth‎, page 231:

     The moral is evident: do not invest in schemes promising enormous and quick returns unless you have investigated them in a thoroughly business manner.

3. Supporting business, conducive to the conduct of business.
   • 1867, “Amiens”, in Edmund Hodgson Yates, editor, Tinsley's Magazine‎, page 430:

     Amiens is a thoroughly business town, the business being chiefly with the flax-works.

   • 2013 June 8, “Obama goes troll-hunting”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8839, page 55:

     According to this saga of intellectual-property misanthropy, these creatures [patent trolls] roam the business world, buying up patents and then using them to demand extravagant payouts from companies they accuse of infringing them. Often, their victims pay up rather than face the costs of a legal battle.

See also

• Appendix: Animals
• Appendix:English collective nouns

References

• “business”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• business in Keywords for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary, edited by The Keywords Project, Colin MacCabe, Holly Yanacek, 2018.
• “business”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

Czech

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key):

Noun

business m inan

1. business

Declension

Further reading

• business in Příruční slovník jazyka českého, 1935–1957
• business in Slovník spisovného jazyka českého, 1960–1971, 1989

Finnish

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English business.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbisnes/,
• IPA^(key): /ˈpisnes/,
• IPA^(key): /ˈbusinesː/,

Noun

business

1. Alternative spelling of bisnes

Usage notes

It may be advisable to avoid using this term in writing.

Declension

This spelling does not fit nicely into Finnish declension system and is therefore seldom used, and mainly in nominative singular.

Pronunciation "bisnes":

Pronunciation "business":

Synonyms

• See Synonyms-section under bisnes

Derived terms

Further reading

• “business”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎ (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-02

French

Etymology

Borrowed from English business.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /biz.nɛs/
• (Quebec) IPA^(key):

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

business m (plural business)

1. business, firm, company
2. business, affairs

Further reading

• “business”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.

Italian

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English business.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbi.znes/, /ˈbi.znis/
• Rhymes: -iznes, -iznis

Noun

business m (invariable)

1. business (commercial enterprise)

   Synonyms: affare, affari, impresa

References

Polish

Polish Wikipedia has an article on:

business

Wikipedia ^pl

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English business.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈbiz.nɛs/

• Audio

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iznɛs
• Syllabification: busi‧ness

Noun

business m inan

1. (business, education) Alternative spelling of biznes

Declension

Further reading

• business in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• business in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Romanian

Etymology

From Unadapted borrowing from English business.

Noun

business n (plural businessuri)

1. business

Declension

Tatar

Etymology

Borrowed from English business.

Noun

business

1. business

Declension

2=ga
3=nı
4=da
5=dan

References

business dairäläre iğtibarın Tatarstan belän