meowing

Pluralmeowings

1. 1
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The act of producing the short cry that a cat makes.

   The constant meowing at dawn meant the cats wanted breakfast.

   Her kitten's meowing grew louder whenever the food bowl sat empty.

   Similarmewing

   Note

   A noun that counts both ways. Uncountable, it names the noise in general (the constant meowing at dawn). Countable, it becomes meowings, one cry after another, as in the constant meowings of the neighbor's cats. The sound need not come from a cat. Alison Foreman's 2024 IndieWire piece on Fantasia Fest uses it for audiences who meow together as a crowd ritual.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle of meow.

   The stray kept meowing outside until someone finally fed it.

   I could hear the cat meowing from the next room.

   Note

   A verb that takes no object keeps that habit in its -ing form. A cat meows; it does not meow something. Here the form builds progressives (the cat is meowing, the stray kept meowing) and gerunds (meowing at the door won't help). Once it starts counting separate cries and taking a plural, meowings, it has become the noun for the act.

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