Definitions

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

  • intransitive verb To speak wildly, irrationally, or incoherently.
  • intransitive verb To move with great violence or intensity.
  • intransitive verb To speak or write with wild enthusiasm.
  • intransitive verb To attend a rave.
  • intransitive verb To utter or express in a frenzied or unrestrained manner.
  • noun The act or an instance of raving.
  • noun Informal An extravagantly enthusiastic opinion or review.
  • noun An all-night dance party, especially one at which techno, house, or other electronically synthesized music is played.
  • noun Chiefly British A raucous party; a rave-up.
  • adjective Relating to or being an extravagantly enthusiastic opinion or review.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • An obsolete preterit of rive.
  • To rive.
  • To talk like a madman; speak with delirious or passionate extravagance; declaim madly or irrationally; rage in speech.
  • To talk about something with exaggerated earnestness, and usually with little judgment or coherence; declaim enthusiastically, immoderately, or ignorantly.
  • To produce a brawling or turbulent sound; move or act boisterously: used of the action of the elements.
  • To utter in frenzy; say in a wild and excited manner.
  • Same as reave, 3.
  • To tear up; pull or tear the thatch or covering from (a house): same as reave, 4.
  • noun A tearing; a hole or opening made by tearing out or away: as, a rave in an old building.
  • noun One of the side pieces of the body of a wagon or other vehicle.
  • noun A turnip.

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

  • imp. of rive.
  • noun One of the upper side pieces of the frame of a wagon body or a sleigh.
  • transitive verb To utter in madness or frenzy; to say wildly.
  • noun An instance of raving.
  • noun A highly flattering or enthusiastic review of a play, book, etc.
  • noun originally British slang A clamorous dance party, especially one featuring a band or disc jockey playing loud modern rock music oriented toward young people, held in a large room such as a warehouse, often organized by an informal or ad hoc sponsor.
  • intransitive verb To wander in mind or intellect; to be delirious; to talk or act irrationally; to be wild, furious, or raging, as a madman.
  • intransitive verb To rush wildly or furiously.
  • intransitive verb To talk with unreasonable enthusiasm or excessive passion or excitement; -- followed by about, of, or on.

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

  • noun An enthusiastic review (such as of a play).
  • noun An all night dance party filled with electronic dance music (techno, trance, drum and bass etc.) and possibly drug use.
  • verb To speak or write wildly or incoherently'
  • verb To attend a rave (dance party).

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

  • noun a dance party that lasts all night and electronically synthesized music is played
  • verb talk in a noisy, excited, or declamatory manner
  • verb praise enthusiastically
  • noun an extravagantly enthusiastic review
  • verb participate in an all-night techno dance party

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English raven, from Old North French raver, variant of resver, to dream, wander, rave.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Old French raver, variant of resver, of uncertain origin.

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Examples

  • This party theme subculture generally grew in numbers around 1980s, and the term rave was used to describe acid-house movements and "E" - fueled club scenes in Houston.

    xml's Blinklist.com 2008

  • Gunners boss Arsene Wenger had called on his team to maintain the momentum which has dragged them right back into the title rave with five wins from six but it was Everton who made the better start.

    RSSMicro Search - Top News on RSS Feeds 2010

  • The fact that anyone listens to either one of them or takes them seriously when they rant and rave is the surest indication of just how much the American educational system has failed. nea-nea

    Political opposites join forces to rebuild schools 2009

  • I love the end of the segment, when Matt Lauer says: "Look up the word rave in the dictionary, that's it right there."

    Gene Shalit: Bidding farewell to the punniest movie critic in history Jen Chaney 2010

  • In January 1897 Kipling's latest volume of poetry, The Seven Seas, prompted a rave from the usually imperious Harvard savant Charles Eliot Norton, whose esteem for the poems was no doubt colored by his close friendship with the Kipling family.

    Who Was Kipling? 2007

  • THE HARD WAY was great good fun -- and his newest book, which recently received a rave from the NYT, is supposed to be his best yet.

    Paging Julie Brown Roger Sutton 2007

  • The surprise came when I went to www. amazon.com to see if there was a paperback edition and found, along with the expected rave from a librarian, a couple of attacks by parents on the poor moral “value systems” of the book.

    2006 November 18 « One-Minute Book Reviews 2006

  • My current rave is mash-ups, where a DJ mixes two different musical styles together.

    June 2006 2006

  • That policy may win rave headlines in the Daily Mail, and 'hear hear' chants on the right.

    Taking Multi-Culturalism Too Far? 2006

  • My current rave is mash-ups, where a DJ mixes two different musical styles together.

    ON THE BUBBLE with JIM ROLLINS 2006

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