dealing

Pluraldealings

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle of deal.

   The committee is dealing with several urgent budget problems this week.

   Dealing fairly with suppliers has earned the firm a solid reputation.

   Note

   The verb form underneath both nouns: deal + -ing, which as a gerund already names an act and so passed easily into the business-transaction noun. As a participle it follows a form of be (is dealing with the problem). As a gerund it fills noun positions (Dealing fairly pays). At the card table it can stand without an object (Who is dealing?), because that sense of deal needs none.

2. 2
   nouncountable or uncountable

   A person's manner of acting toward others; the way one behaves in interactions and relationships.

   His straight dealing in every matter earned him a sterling reputation.

   Their dealings with the local community were marked by mutual respect.

   Similarconduct, behavior, relations

   Note

   Shakespeare gives this sense its sharpest line, when Shylock says of Christians "whose own hard dealings teaches them suspect / The thoughts of others." Here the plural means a habit of conduct, not a set of deals. The singular verb teaches after a plural subject is not a pattern to copy today. In modern use the singular names a quality, as in fair dealing or straight dealing, while dealings with someone names the relationship itself.

3. 3
   nouncountableplural

   An instance of buying, selling, or trading; a single business transaction.

   The broker insisted that each dealing be documented for the auditors.

   Their underhanded dealings eventually attracted the regulator's attention.

   Similartransaction, trade

   Note

   In business talk the word lives mostly in the plural: people speak of a firm's dealings far more often than of a single dealing. The plural gathers a whole run of transactions into one view, as in shady dealings or dealings with a rival. The singular, when it appears, picks out one transaction. The noun is simply deal + -ing, from Old English dǣling, so at bottom a dealing is the act of dealing.

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