IMPERATIVE
Dictionary entry overview: What does imperative mean?
• IMPERATIVE (noun)
The noun IMPERATIVE has 2 senses:
1. a mood that expresses an intention to influence the listener's behavior
2. some duty that is essential and urgent
Familiarity information: IMPERATIVE used as a noun is rare.
• IMPERATIVE (adjective)
The adjective IMPERATIVE has 2 senses:
1. requiring attention or action
2. relating to verbs in the imperative mood
Familiarity information: IMPERATIVE used as an adjective is rare.
Dictionary entry details
• IMPERATIVE (noun)
Meaning:
A mood that expresses an intention to influence the listener's behavior
Classified under:
Nouns denoting relations between people or things or ideas
Synonyms:
imperative; imperative form; imperative mood; jussive mood
Hypernyms ("imperative" is a kind of...):
modality; mode; mood (verb inflections that express how the action or state is conceived by the speaker)
Meaning:
Some duty that is essential and urgent
Classified under:
Nouns denoting acts or actions
Hypernyms ("imperative" is a kind of...):
duty; obligation; responsibility (the social force that binds you to the courses of action demanded by that force)
• IMPERATIVE (adjective)
Meaning:
Requiring attention or action
Context examples:
as nuclear weapons proliferate, preventing war becomes imperative / requests that grew more and more imperative
Similar:
shrill; strident (being sharply insistent on being heard)
pressing; urgent (compelling immediate action)
desperate (showing extreme urgency or intensity especially because of great need or desire)
peremptory (not allowing contradiction or refusal)
clamant; crying; exigent; insistent; instant (demanding attention)
adjuratory (containing a solemn charge or command)
Also:
assertive (inclined to bold and confident assertion; aggressively self-assured)
Antonym:
beseeching (begging)
Meaning:
Relating to verbs in the imperative mood
Classified under:
Relational adjectives (pertainyms)
Domain category:
grammar (the branch of linguistics that deals with syntax and morphology (and sometimes also deals with semantics or morphology))
Pertainym:
imperative mood (a mood that expresses an intention to influence the listener's behavior)
