communicate Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. verb transmit information
    put across; pass along; pass on; pass.
    • Please communicate this message to all employees
    • pass along the good news
  2. verb transmit thoughts or feelings
    intercommunicate.
    • He communicated his anxieties to the psychiatrist
  3. verb transfer to another
    transmit; convey.
    • communicate a disease
  4. verb join or connect
    • The rooms communicated
  5. verb be in verbal contact; interchange information or ideas
    • He and his sons haven't communicated for years
    • Do you communicate well with your advisor?
  6. verb administer Communion; in church
  7. verb receive Communion, in the Catholic church
    commune.

WordNet

Com*mu"ni*cate transitive verb
Etymology
L. communicatus, p. p. of communicare to communicate, fr. communis common. See Commune, v. i.
Wordforms
imperfect & past participle Communicated; present participle & verbal noun Communicating
Definitions
  1. To share in common; to participate in. Obs.
    To thousands that communicate our loss. B. Jonson
  2. To impart; to convey; as, to communicate a disease or a sensation; to communicate motion by means of a crank.
    Where God is worshiped, there he communicates his blessings and holy influences. Jer. Taylor.
  3. To make known; to recount; to give; to impart; as, to communicate information to any one.
  4. To administer the communion to. R.
    She [the church] . . . may communicate him. Jer. Taylor.
    ✍ This verb was formerly followed by with before the person receiving, but now usually takes to after it.
    He communicated those thoughts only with the Lord Digby. Clarendon.
    Syn. -- To impart; bestow; confer; reveal; disclose; tell; announce; recount; make known. -- To Communicate, Impart, Reveal. Communicate is the more general term, and denotes the allowing of others to partake or enjoy in common with ourselves. Impart is more specific. It is giving to others a part of what we had held as our own, or making them our partners; as, to impart our feelings; to impart of our property, etc. Hence there is something more intimate in imparting intelligence than in communicating it. To reveal is to disclose something hidden or concealed; as, to reveal a secret.
Com*mu"ni*cate intransitive verb
Definitions
  1. To share or participate; to possess or enjoy in common; to have sympathy.
    Ye did communicate with my affliction. Philip. iv. 4.
  2. To give alms, sympathy, or aid.
    To do good and to communicate forget not. Heb. xiii. 16.
  3. To have intercourse or to be the means of intercourse; as, to communicate with another on business; to be connected; as, a communicating artery.
    Subjects suffered to communicate and to have intercourse of traffic. Hakluyt.
    The whole body is nothing but a system of such canals, which all communicate with one another. Arbutnot.
  4. To partake of the Lord's supper; to commune.
    The primitive Christians communicated every day. Jer. Taylor.

Webster 1913