sneezing

Pluralsneezings

1. 1
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The act of producing a sneeze: the body's sudden, forceful expulsion of air through the nose and mouth.

   Repeated sneezing is one of the first signs of a dust allergy.

   A fit of sneezing interrupted the speaker halfway through her talk.

   Note

   Most often a mass noun for the activity as a whole: a fit of sneezing, constant sneezing. It also counts, and the plural sneezings appears when a writer catalogs noises one by one. John O'Loughlin's Two Sides of the Same Coin (2011) sets "snivellings and sneezings" among the coughings and shufflings of a reference room. For a single event, the everyday word is simply a sneeze.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of sneeze.

   Sneezing loudly, he fumbled for a handkerchief in his pocket.

   She couldn't stop sneezing during the long, dusty drive home.

   Note

   The verb form here usually stands without an object, as in you can't stop sneezing. It can take one, though, for whatever the sneeze sends out: sneezing air or mucus from the nose. Even as a gerund it keeps behaving like a verb and takes adverbs (sneezing loudly, sneezing helplessly). That habit sets it apart from the noun, which takes adjectives instead.

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