contraction

Short definition from Wiktionary

Noun

1. 1
   Senses relating to becoming involved with or entering into, especially entering into a contract: An act of incurring debt; also (generally), an act of acquiring something (generally negative).
2. 2
   Senses relating to becoming involved with or entering into, especially entering into a contract: An act of entering into a contract or agreement; specifically, a contract of marriage; a contracting; also (obsolete), a betrothal.
3. 3
   Senses relating to becoming involved with or entering into, especially entering into a contract: The process of contracting or becoming infected with a disease.
4. 4
   A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: An abridgement or shortening of writing, etc.; an abstract, a summary; also (uncountable), brevity, conciseness.
5. 5
   A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: A stage of wound healing during which the wound edges are gradually pulled together.
6. 6
   A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: A shortening of a muscle during its use; specifically, a strong and often painful shortening of the uterine muscles prior to or during childbirth.
7. 7
   A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: A period of economic decline or negative growth.
8. 8
   A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: A process whereby one or more sounds of a free morpheme (a word) are reduced or lost, such that it becomes a bound morpheme (a clitic) that attaches phonologically to an adjacent word.
9. 9
   A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: Synonym of syncope (“the elision or loss of a sound from the interior of a word, especially of a vowel sound with loss of a syllable”).
10. 10
    A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: The preimage of the given ideal under the given homomorphism.
11. 11
    A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: In the English language: a shortened form of a word, often with omitted letters replaced by an apostrophe or a diacritical mark.
12. 12
    A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking: A shorthand symbol indicating an omission for the purpose of brevity.
13. 13
    Senses relating to pulling together or shortening: An act of collecting or gathering.