Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

kissing cousin

/ˌkɪsɪŋ ˈkʌz(ə)n/

Word Rarity Rare

Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.84 in modern English

Syllables: kiss-ing cou-sin
IPA: /ˌkɪsɪŋ ˈkʌz(ə)n/

20

Scrabble Score

13

Letters

3

Syllables

8

Unique Chars

Meaning

noun

A relatively distant relative, or a friend, who is familiar enough to be greeted with a kiss.

noun

A thing which is related or similar to another thing.

Example Sentences

"[A]fter the initial public brouhaha, wildlife administrators will suddenly decide that the classification of the Aleutian Canada goose as an endangered species was a gross mistake all along. Either the bird will be downgraded to "threatened" status—which means it can be hunted—or it will be declared a nonspecies, as has already happened to all its taxonomic kissing cousins."
"Silicon is a “kissing cousin” of carbon. Notice it immediately below carbon in the Periodic Table. The arrangement of silicon’s outer electrons resembles those of carbon. For this reason, silicon and carbon are chemically similar."

Etymology

From kissing + cousin.

Regional Pronunciation

American English: /ˌkɪsɪŋ ˈkʌz(ə)n/
British English: /ˌkɪsɪŋ ˈkʌzn̩/

Inflected Forms

kissing cousins (plural)

Synonyms

kissing kin cousin cousin-german

Rhymes With

dozen baker's dozen cozen

Questions

How do you pronounce kissing cousin?: The recorded pronunciation is /ˌkɪsɪŋ ˈkʌz(ə)n/.
What does kissing cousin mean?: A relatively distant relative, or a friend, who is familiar enough to be greeted with a kiss.
Where does kissing cousin come from?: From kissing + cousin.

How to pronounce kissing cousin

Open the pronunciation page — Open the Speakur entry for “kissing cousin”.
Read the phonetic spelling — Read the IPA spelling (/ˌkɪsɪŋ ˈkʌz(ə)n/) so you know which sounds to aim for.
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