Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A touching, feeling, or manipulating with the hands.
  • noun The process of packing and distributing merchandise.
  • noun The way in which something is handled or taken care of.
  • noun The way in which a presentation, especially an artistic or theatrical work, is treated.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A touching, fingering, or using with the hand; manipulation; touch: either literally or figuratively: as, the handling of the bow in violin-playing; an artist's handling of his subject.
  • noun The act of supplying with a handle or handles; the operation of putting a handle on: as, the handling of pottery, or of saws.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A touching, controlling, managing, using, etc., with the hand or hands, or as with the hands. See handle, v. t.
  • noun (Drawing, Painting, etc.) The mode of using the pencil or brush, etc.; style of touch.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Present participle of handle.
  • noun A touching, controlling, managing, using, take care of, etc., with the hand or hands, or as with the hands. See handle
  • noun art The mode of using the pencil or brush; style of touch - Fairholt
  • noun A criminal offence, the trade with stolen goods.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the management of someone or something
  • noun manual (or mechanical) carrying or moving or delivering or working with something
  • noun the action of touching with the hands (or the skillful use of the hands) or by the use of mechanical means

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From handle.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English handlinge, hondlunge, from Old English handlung ("handling"), equivalent to handle +‎ -ing. Cognate with Dutch handeling ("trade, operation, action"), German Handlung ("act, action"), Swedish handling ("act, deed, action").

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Examples

  • Ceylon Records - the label handling - American U.S.

    The Final Hope AKA Dartflix Edition #38 Dart Adams 2008

  • Once they return home, if they are injured in the war in a combat activity, as both John and Kevin were, eventually the US government is going to pay back the insurance companies for the cost of care for these guys, and then they will add another 15 percent fee on top of that to pay the carriers like what they call a handling fee or a processing fee.

    Democracy Now! 2009

  • Once they return home, if they are injured in the war in a combat activity, as both John and Kevin were, eventually the US government is going to pay back the insurance companies for the cost of care for these guys, and then they will add another 15 percent fee on top of that to pay the carriers like what they call a handling fee or a processing fee.

    Democracy Now! 2009

  • On Monday, the National Prosecuting Authority announced it would drop corruption charges against Zuma, saying the taped conversations between former NPA head Bulelani Ngcuka and former Scorpions boss Leonard McCarthy pointed to an “abuse of process” in handling the Zuma case.

    Global Voices in English » South Africa: Yet Another Jacob Zuma Fiasco… 2009

  • Congratulations to the Indonesian Police and its Densus 88, which made a big step in handling terorism in Indonesia.

    Global Voices in English » Terrorism crackdown in Indonesia 2009

  • I hope that judge will be fair in handling the sentencing phase.

    Victim: Courts did more harm than Polanski 2009

  • The personnel at the Chicago airport were polite and obviously embarrassed as they informed us we could not hand carry those two gift bottles of expensive tequila on board and would either have to check them through where, they assured us, the bottles would definitely be broken in handling or leave the tequila in Chicago.

    Just back from a month in upstate New York 2009

  • I'm worried my local Phoenix police force, whom are already stetched thin, will be even more diluted in handling community issues more pressing than non violent illegal immigrant processing.

    Natl. Poll: More favor than oppose Arizona immigration law 2010

  • In case of mass incident, it is common for the government to repress the Han Chinese, but they would be very careful in handling Uyghur people's protest.

    Global Voices in English » China: Urumqi mass incident and beyond 2009

  • He commends the decision taken by the Scottish government (though, like many, is suspicious of the reasons behind it), and is critical of the behaviour of the Libyan authorities in handling the issue:

    Global Voices in English » World: Reactions to the Release of the “Lockerbie bomber” 2009

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