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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
dictate
I.verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
common sense dictates sth (=tells you something very clearly)
▪ Common sense dictates that you should avoid handling wild animals.
logic dictates sth (=used to say that something will definitely happen because of logic)
▪ Logic dictates that poorer people will be more affected by the rise in inflation.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
how
▪ The circumstances will dictate how much you can make of it from the standpoint of good video.
▪ In short, many corporations and data centers have computing security policies and practices that dictate how data must be protected.
▪ For this reason it is impossible to come up with universal rules dictating how explanations are to be provided.
▪ The outcome will dictate how one-fifth of mankind relates to a technology many are convinced owns the future.
▪ Actually, yellow and blue dictate how warm or cool a color is.
largely
▪ These averages are dictated largely by the very high proportion of volunteers that operate at club level.
▪ Their decisions largely dictate the use of all resources and they must accept the management responsibility which goes with clinical freedom.
▪ The whole exercise, indeed, was largely dictated by the very proper wish to see standards of education rise.
to
▪ I will not be dictated to by a housekeeper.
▪ Rory had fumed, unaccustomed to being dictated to, but his will had proved the stronger.
■ NOUN
action
▪ As a result he developed links with Hastings as well as Gloucester, but it was the latter which dictated his actions in 1483.
▪ Watching hockey FoxTrax makes it seem you can dictate the action.
▪ He hadn't done a bad job of dictating her actions so far but that didn't mean it had to continue.
choice
▪ This consideration had dictated his choice of nephew.
▪ The cuts dictate the choice of ministers.
circumstances
▪ However, if circumstances dictate using the post then make the best of it by: 1.
▪ He should have felt as tired and inadequate as his age and circumstances dictated, but he did not.
▪ The circumstances will dictate how much you can make of it from the standpoint of good video.
▪ The pattern seems to be, and fast changing circumstances dictate this more than anything, not to dwell on problems.
consideration
▪ Apart from not knowing how long to sub-let the space for, there are other considerations that dictate a company's strategy.
▪ Tax considerations should not dictate investment judgment.
▪ However, tactical considerations may dictate that some conditions and definition terms are omitted from the vendors' draft of the heads.
▪ This simple consideration dictates the design of the synthetic oligonucleotides.
▪ This consideration had dictated his choice of nephew.
kind
▪ In one way, the association with Volvo dictated the kind of car that the Safrane is.
▪ The intended use would dictate the kind of pack to be purchased.
▪ These beliefs about what low attainers can not do dictate and reflect the kind of learning experience these pupils have.
▪ A rigorous syllabus and lots of tests dictate the kind of work done.
law
▪ That brings us back to Condorcet's remark that the general laws dictating the phenomena of the universe are necessary and constant.
▪ Consequently, those laws tend to dictate impartial treatment and equal service to all members of the targeted group.
letter
▪ Alternatively, you can dictate your letter to us over the telephone.
▪ The pastor called in his secretary and dictated a letter to Scott saying he and the elders would meet him.
▪ Miss Hinkle was always trying to make me an office magnate, dictating letters and answering telephone calls.
▪ I dictated a resignation letter to my secretary.
▪ It also ensures that omissions are not made simply because you have dictated the letter so often that familiarity has bred contempt.
▪ The moment Gerald got back to Hull he dictated a letter to the Foreign Office.
▪ Send to Alternatively, you can dictate your letter to us over the telephone.
market
▪ The terms attached to such loans are dictated by market conditions and the usual criteria of security, creditworthiness and risk.
need
▪ The purchaser's plans may be commercially sensitive, dictating the need to first approach targets anonymously.
▪ These transient colonialists dictated their needs, and the local populations in general complied.
▪ At first the growth of a child is dictated by biological needs.
▪ This is usually dictated by the need for a flat area immediately next to the house to act as a sheltered sun trap.
pace
▪ Alex's task of dictating the pace was quite as difficult as Michael's of delivering the lines.
▪ One of the beauties of Springs is that you dictate the pace.
policy
▪ This basic premise also dictated Edward's policy elsewhere.
▪ Good managers know that fear can not be allowed to dictate organizational policy.
▪ The West supported him, gave him money, and dictated his economic policies.
▪ It was therefore Charles who could dictate policy and law in most respects.
sense
▪ I should have thought that good sense would dictate that some one who opposes every measure begins to lose credibility.
■ VERB
allow
▪ Ultimately, however, market forces should not be allowed to dictate the extent of regulation.
▪ He said he has missed the up-tempo pace he was allowed to dictate.
▪ Licence to allow another person to dictate the rising of the sun, the seasons of the moon?
▪ Good managers know that fear can not be allowed to dictate organizational policy.
▪ We have lost the initiative and allowed our opponents to dictate the subject - even the rules - of the debate.
▪ During the 90s Washington fell into the trap of allowing events to dictate the relationship, with increasingly destabilising results.
▪ She had allowed him to dictate what happened, yet now she wanted more.
let
▪ Ellen wanted none of it so let her dictate her terms.
▪ It made Bernice jealous, but she would never let that dictate her behaviour.
seem
▪ That too the baby seemed to dictate.
▪ Watching hockey FoxTrax makes it seem you can dictate the action.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ Fashion designers no longer dictate skirt lengths.
▪ She refused to be dictated to by some stupid official in Washington.
▪ The amount of funds we receive dictates what we can do.
▪ Your parents have no right to dictate how you should spend your money.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ All or some of the labels can be dictated or, for beginning students, the labels may simply be copied.
▪ At least once a week we were tested on our ability to copy correctly a literary passage dictated to us.
▪ Built between 1283 and 1289, the castle's shape is dictated by the very rock on which it stands.
▪ Milton had two or was it three daughters and they wrote down his poems as he dictated.
▪ Previously, the Constitution dictated that the President was head of the army.
▪ The contracts are dictated by the HMOs, and that makes for some very ragged edges.
▪ The need to survive, which always dictates the moral standards of society, once more underlined the role of the women.
II.noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ VERB
follow
▪ Though if we did follow the dictates of the market-place, that's where we'd be heading, fast.
▪ But at least Hayling was free to follow the dictates of his large and sometimes cumbersome political conscience.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ The city's policy clearly violates the dictates of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ Human beings are going to resist cultural dictates that are too inconsistent with their innate desires.
▪ When I was very young, the things I wanted to do were not permitted by social dictates.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Dictate

Dictate \Dic"tate\, n. [L. dictatum. See Dictate, v. t.] A statement delivered with authority; an order; a command; an authoritative rule, principle, or maxim; a prescription; as, listen to the dictates of your conscience; the dictates of the gospel.

I credit what the Grecian dictates say.
--Prior.

Syn: Command; injunction; direction suggestion; impulse; admonition.

Dictate

Dictate \Dic"tate\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Dictated; p. pr. & vb. n. Dictating.] [L. dictatus, p. p. of dictare, freq. of dicere to say. See Diction, and cf. Dight.]

  1. To tell or utter so that another may write down; to inspire; to compose; as, to dictate a letter to an amanuensis.

    The mind which dictated the Iliad.
    --Wayland.

    Pages dictated by the Holy Spirit.
    --Macaulay.

  2. To say; to utter; to communicate authoritatively; to deliver (a command) to a subordinate; to declare with authority; to impose; as, to dictate the terms of a treaty; a general dictates orders to his troops.

    Whatsoever is dictated to us by God must be believed.
    --Watts.

    Syn: To suggest; prescribe; enjoin; command; point out; urge; admonish.

Dictate

Dictate \Dic"tate\, v. i.

  1. To speak as a superior; to command; to impose conditions (on).

    Who presumed to dictate to the sovereign.
    --Macaulay.

  2. To compose literary works; to tell what shall be written or said by another.

    Sylla could not skill of letters, and therefore knew not how to dictate.
    --Bacon.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
dictate

1590s, "to practice dictation, say aloud for another to write down," from Latin dictatus, past participle of dictare "say often, prescribe," frequentative of dicere "tell, say" (see diction). Sense of "to command" is 1620s. Related: Dictated; dictates; dictating.

dictate

1590s, from Latin dictatum "something dictated," noun use of neuter past participle of dictare (see dictate (v.)).

Wiktionary
dictate

n. An order or command. vb. 1 To order, command, control. 2 To speak in order for someone to write down the words.

WordNet
dictate
  1. n. an authoritative rule

  2. a guiding principle; "the dictates of reason"

  3. v. issue commands or orders for [syn: order, prescribe]

  4. say out loud for the purpose of recording; "He dictated a report to his secretary"

  5. rule as a dictator

Wikipedia
Dictate

Dictate can refer to:

  • Dictation (disambiguation)
  • Dictator
  • Edict

Usage examples of "dictate".

Yet as before, Adams remained reluctant to profess his love for her, though it was from the heart that he wrote: May Heaven permit you and me to enjoy the cool of the evening of life in tranquility, undisturbed by the cares of politics and war--and above all with the sweetest of all reflections that neither ambition, nor vanity, nor any base motive, or sordid passion through the whole course of great and terrible events that have attended it, have drawn us aside from the line of duty and the dictates of our consciences.

He cared nothing at all for Raoul, and would not have come to his aid had not the dictates of Adonian social society required it.

In three generations, perhaps only two, this gene, carrying its message to the Africans, dictated negative survival, meaning death.

I made use of the time to dictate some dispatches, and Antinous stretched out at my feet.

Such are the circumstances of this ostentatious and improbable relation, dictated, as it too plainly appears, by the vanity of the monarch, adorned by the unblushing servility of his flatterers, and received without contradiction by a distant and obsequious senate.

Further, when Sir Robert Appleton is away from home, he will make no attempt to dictate how his wife spends her time.

It had been no part of his plan to fight in the thickets of the Wilderness, and yet an adversary of but one-third his own strength was about to reverse his whole programme, and dictate the terms of the first battles of the campaign.

Southill in Bedfordshire, he was pleased to dictate it to me from memory.

The sound differed from the hiss of escaping air that she sometimes heard in the narrower passages where, in response to the dictates of Bernoulli, the constant zephyr freshened into something stronger.

We would save ourselves much trouble if we could agree that the proper place for most bioethical thought lies in counseling those affected, not in dictating the spectrum of possibilities.

In obedience to the dictates of the blindest prejudices and the most fatuous loyalties they did their utmost to kill men against whom they had no conceivable grievance, and they were in their turn butchered gallantly, fighting to the last.

Samut Khan led them to a small office where the Bokharan minister of foreign affairs was dictating to a Persian scribe.

The cohesiveness of the old sorcerers was such that it allowed them to become perceptually and physically everything the specific position of their assemblage points dictated.

The dictates of true policy dissuaded her from contributing to her further conquest in that kingdom, which would have proved the source of contention among the allies, depressed the house of Bourbon below the standard of importance which the balance of Europe required it should maintain, and aggrandize the states-general at the expense of Great Britain.

Thus Augustus, after all his fairer prospects had been snatched from him by untimely deaths, rested his last hopes on Tiberius, obtained for his adopted son the censorial and tribunitian powers, and dictated a law, by which the future prince was invested with an authority equal to his own, over the provinces and the armies.