parentheses
- 1Plural of parenthesis.
The editor asked her to remove the nested parentheses for clarity.
He enclosed the side comment in parentheses so it wouldn't interrupt the main sentence.
Note
An irregular plural: the -is of the singular becomes -es, so one parenthesis, two parentheses. A single curved mark is itself a parenthesis, so the pair ( ) is spoken of as parentheses, and in mainly US usage the word means round brackets specifically. Mathematics uses them to group terms under a common operator or to enclose a vector's components. The plural can also count several inserted remarks or digressions.
parentheses is a form of parenthesis
parenthesis, noun: Either of a pair of curved brackets, ( and ), used to enclose explanatory or supplementary material in a text. Full entry
- Forms
- parenthesisparentheses plural
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