sea change
/ˈsiːˌt͡ʃeɪnd͡ʒ/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.94 in modern English
15
Scrabble Score
9
Letters
1
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
Example Sentences
- "Public opinion has undergone a sea change since the 2002 elections."
- "A few days wrought, as it were, a magical "sea change" in everything around us. The late dark and angry sea, lashed up into roaring and swashing surges, became calm and sunny; the rude winds died away; and gradually a light breeze sprang up directly aft."
- "His [Frederick Marryat's] last work, ‘Percival Keane’ (1842), betrays no falling-off, but, on the contrary, is one of the most vigorous and interesting of his ‘sea changes.’"
- "[S]uddenly, a "sea change" came over his features, […]"
- "Assuredly the fine old North Carolinan [William Alexander Graham], who has meanwhile himself gone under politically, as little anticipated while penning this sententious answer the "sea-change" as the sectional one which was to come after him. A "sea-change" has indeed transpired."
- "It is interesting to watch how the most unpromising subject seems to warm and assimilate with his [John Randolph of Roanoke's] genius. Everything undergoes a seachange."
Etymology
From Act I, scene ii, of The Tempest (1610–1611) by the English playwright William Shakespeare (1564–1616), spelling modernized: “Full fathom five thy father lies, / Of his bones are coral made: / Those are pearls that were his eyes, / Nothing of him that doth fade, / But doth suffer a sea-change / Into something rich and strange”. The passage refers to how a drowned man’s body lying on the sea bed had been transformed by the sea.
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈsiːˌt͡ʃeɪnd͡ʒ/
- British English: /ˈsiːˌt͡ʃeɪnd͡ʒ/