RECIPROCAL

Reciprocal

A reciprocal is a linguistic structure that marks a particular kind of relationship between two noun phrases. In a reciprocal construction, each of the participants occupies both the role of agent and patient with respect to each other. For example, the English sentence "John and Mary cut each other's hair", contains a reciprocal structure: John cuts Mary's hair, and Mary cuts John's.

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reciprocal

Noun

  1. Of a number, the number obtained by dividing 1 by the given number; the result of exchanging the numerator and the denominator of a fraction.
    0.5 is the reciprocal of 2.

Adjective

  1. Of a feeling, action or such: mutual, uniformly felt or done by each party towards the other or others; two-way.
    reciprocal love; reciprocal duties
  2. Mutually interchangeable.
  3. Reflexive; applied to pronouns and verbs, but sometimes limited to pronouns that express mutual action.
  4. Used to denote different kinds of mutual relation; often with reference to the substitution of reciprocals for given quantities.
  5. contrary or opposite


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: reciprocal
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