supervise
Formssupervises, supervising, supervised
- 1To oversee or direct a task, project, or organization, making sure it runs properly.
She supervises the construction crew on the downtown project.
Senior nurses supervise the ward during the night shift.
Similaroversee, manage, direct, run, superintend
Note
Latin built the word from super, "over," and videre, "to see." Its Latin pieces say exactly what English oversee says in native ones, and survey is the same Latin word arriving by another route. The object can be people (supervise the staff) or the work itself (supervise the administration). The present participle also serves as an adjective, as in W. B. Maxwell's "a supervising eye" in The Mirror and the Lamp (1918).
- 2To look over a written text in order to read it; to peruse.
Let me supervise the canzonet.
1590, William Shakespeare, Love's Labour's LostNote
Here the word stays close to its Latin parts, super 'over' and videre 'see': simply to look something over. When Shakespeare writes "Let me supervise the canzonet" (1590), he means read the little song, not take charge of it. Tom Brown in 1700 stretches it toward taking in a view, close to its doublet survey. In older texts read it as peruse. Today the word belongs wholly to the overseeing meaning.
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Origin
Borrowed from Medieval Latin supervisus, from supervidere, formed from Latin super ('over') and videre ('to see'). It is a doublet of survey.