mention

English

Etymology

From Middle English mencioun, mention, from Old French mention, from Latin mentiōnem, accusative of mentiō (“a mention, calling to mind”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈmɛnʃən/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Hyphenation: men‧tion
• Rhymes: -ɛnʃən

Noun

mention (plural mentions)

1. A speaking or notice of anything, usually in a brief or cursory manner. Used especially in the phrase make mention of.
   • 1611, The Holy Bible,  (King James Version), London: Robert Barker, , →OCLC, Psalms 71:16:

     I will make mention of thy righteousness.

   • 1613 (date written), William Shakespeare, [John Fletcher], “The Famous History of the Life of King Henry the Eight”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies  (First Folio), London: Isaac Iaggard, and Ed Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, :

     And sleep in dull, cold marble, where no mention / Of me more must be heard of.

2. (Internet, plural only) A social media feed, a list of replies or posts mentioning a person.
   • 2012 November 20, Kavitha Rao, “The Problems With Policing Sexism on Twitter”, in The Atlantic:

     "I would like Twitter to put some kind of filters in place," suggests Prakash. "At present I can't see troll tweets if I block the user, but others who go into my 'mentions' can do so, and read the graphic abuse, which is disturbing."

   • 2017 March 28, Jaleesa M. Jones, “Time to update your resumes: Chance the Rapper is hiring an intern”, in USA Today:

     In response to the flood of replies, Chance returned to Twitter several hours later — presumably, after his mentions calmed down — to request that users format their resumes as "creative decks, pitches or proposals" […] .

   • 2018 December 3, Bari Weiss, Eve Peyser, “Can You Like the Person You Love to Hate?”, in The New York Times:

     I didn’t delete my account — yet! I know! I am full of shame! — but I did change the way I use it (no looking at my mentions; far less tweeting; aiming to highlight the work of people I like rather than criticize the work of those I don’t).

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

mention (third-person singular simple present mentions, present participle mentioning, simple past and past participle mentioned)

1. To make a short reference to something.
   • 2013 June 1, “End of the peer show”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8838, page 71:

     Finance is seldom romantic. But the idea of peer-to-peer lending comes close. This is an industry that brings together individual savers and lenders on online platforms. […] Banks and credit-card firms are kept out of the picture. Talk to enough people in the field and someone is bound to mention the “democratisation of finance”.

2. (philosophy, linguistics) To utter a word or expression in order to refer to the expression itself, as opposed to its usual referent.
   • 2006, Tony Evans, The Transforming Word: Discovering the Power and Provision of the Bible, Moody Publishers, →ISBN, page 140:

     I can illustrate this by mentioning the word lead. Now you have no way of knowing for sure which meaning I have in mind until I give it some context by using it in a sentence.

   • 2009, Lieven Vandelanotte, Speech and Thought Representation in English: A Cognitive-functional Approach, Walter de Gruyter, →ISBN, page 124:

     If the verbatimness view derives from the popular notion that DST repeats 'the actual words spoken', a second line of thought takes its cue from Quine's (1940: 23–26, 1960: 146–156) philosophical distinction between words which are “used” vs. words which are merely “mentioned”.

   • 2013, Richard Hanley, South Park and Philosophy: Bigger, Longer, and More Penetrating, Open Court, →ISBN:

     If I said rightly, “'Niggers' is a seven letter word,” I would be mentioning the word, and when we write it, we use mention-quotes for this purpose (speech typically lacks quotes, except for the occasional air-quotes). If I said, rightly or wrongly, “Niggers are good athletes,” then I would be using “niggers,” not merely mentioning it.

Synonyms

(make a short reference to something): See Thesaurus:mention

Derived terms

Translations

Anagrams

• nontime, omentin

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin mentiōnem.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /mɑ̃.sjɔ̃/

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

mention f (plural mentions)

1. mention (act of mentioning)
2. slogan

Derived terms

• faire mention

Related terms

• mentionner

Further reading

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

Old French

Alternative forms

• mencion
• mension

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin mentiō, mentionis.

Noun

mention oblique singular, f (oblique plural mentions, nominative singular mention, nominative plural mentions)

1. mention (act of mentioning)

See also

• mentevoir