dynamics
- 1The forces that drive change, growth, or development in something such as a group, a market, or a relationship.
The dynamics of the marketplace forced the company to rethink its strategy.
Shifting power dynamics between the two nations reshaped the entire region.
Note
Forces in the physicist's sense, carried over into human affairs, where what pushes and pulls is a market, a rivalry or a political order. It usually comes with a word that says what is in motion, as in changing dynamics or power dynamics, or with of: the dynamics of international politics. Unlike the branch of physics, it takes a plural verb: the dynamics have shifted.
- 2In physics, the branch of mechanics that studies how forces affect the way objects move.
Students of dynamics calculate how friction slows a sliding crate.
Dynamics lets engineers predict the path of a spacecraft after launch.
Oppositestatics
Note
A field named the way physics and optics are: dynamic plus -ics. Within mechanics it is the part that asks why bodies move as they do, working through Newton's laws, which relate force, mass and acceleration. As the name of a subject it is uncountable and takes a singular verb (dynamics is central to engineering). That sets it apart from the forces-of-change meaning, which runs plural.
- 3The volume at which music is to be performed, marked by terms like piano, mezzo piano, mezzo forte, and forte.
The conductor shaped the dynamics carefully, drawing the orchestra down to a whisper before the final chord.
Beginning pianists often ignore the dynamics written into the score.
Note
A performer's instructions rather than a measurement: the terms written into a score, running from pianissimo up through forte, along with crescendo and diminuendo for growing gradually louder or softer. Musicians speak of observing, ignoring or shaping the dynamics, and the word keeps its plural agreement: the dynamics in this passage are marked with care.
- 4The rise and fall in the level or amplitude of a sound, or of a piece of recorded audio, over time.
Heavy compression squashed the track's dynamics, leaving it loud but lifeless.
The engineer preserved the dynamics so the drums still hit hard against the quiet verses.
Note
Here loudness is something measured in the signal rather than asked of a player: the spread between a recording's quietest and loudest moments. Limiting and compression narrow that spread, which is why engineers talk of dynamics being squashed or preserved. The word stays plural (the dynamics are intact), and it pairs naturally with the markings in a score, which tell a performer what loudness to aim for.
Practice
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Origin
Formed from "dynamic" combined with the suffix "-ics".