Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A sudden clever plan or idea.
- noun A sudden, violent disturbance of the mind.
- intransitive verb To engage in or organize brainstorming.
- intransitive verb To consider or investigate (an issue, for example) by brainstorming.
- intransitive verb To think of or produce (a solution to a problem, for example) by brainstorming.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun the clear (and often sudden) understanding of a complex situation; a sudden brilliant insight.
- verb to try to solve a problem by discussing it exhaustively in an intense group meeting encouraging uninhibited and spontaneous contributions from all members.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun US A sudden thought, particularly one that solves a long-standing problem.
- noun
brainstorming - noun UK An unexpected
mental error. - verb To
investigate something, orsolve aproblem usingbrainstorming . - verb To
participate in a brainstormingsession .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- verb try to solve a problem by thinking intensely about it
- noun the clear (and often sudden) understanding of a complex situation
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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You must brainstorm from the beginning of a project – before you even write a word of it – through the outlining, the writing, and the final edit and polish.
NaNoWriMo Workshop – Find, and Flush Out, an Idea « Write Anything 2009
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You must brainstorm from the beginning of a project – before you even write a word of it – through the outlining, the writing, and the final edit and polish.
NaNoWriMo Workshop – Find, and Flush Out, an Idea « Write Anything 2008
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The brainstorm is this: one could very easily use Meetup to arrange a local “Old School CD Share.”
No Title 2004
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If I weren't set up for that and were looking for outside hosting, I'd probably go for something like Meilin Miranda's latest brainstorm, which is a co-hosting site for authors doing crowdsourced fiction: DigitalNovelists. com.
ceciliatan: Web serial novel: how the experiment is going ceciliatan 2010
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What you come up with in a brainstorm is a seed of an idea that needs to be cultivated to grow.
Noah Brier on brainstorming dave gray 2005
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I wanted to brainstorm with you, however, the closest you'll ever come to a brainstorm is a light drizzle.
Home 2009
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I wanted to brainstorm with you, however, the closest you'll ever come to a brainstorm is a light drizzle.
Home 2009
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I wanted to brainstorm with you, however, the closest you'll ever come to a brainstorm is a light drizzle.
Home 2009
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I wanted to brainstorm with you, however, the closest you'll ever come to a brainstorm is a light drizzle.
Home 2009
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What we need in order to brainstorm is to jolt the system, force the brain to think in patterns and perceptions that it has no experience or former guidelines to use.
Innovate on Purpose 2008
bilby commented on the word brainstorm
"In the following over, Australia were 119-4 as Michael Clarke suffered a brainstorm facing Harbhajan, electing to play no shot to a standard off-break to go leg before wicket."
- 'Symonds leads Australia recovery', BBC website, 2 Jan 2008.
If you can decipher the cricket jargon, this is a usage of brainstorm in its (contronymic) second and rarer sense, ie. to have a violent, sudden disturbance of the mind.
January 2, 2008