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(from Dictionary.com)
SUppress
| 1. |
to put an end to the activities of (a person, body of persons, etc.): to suppress the Communist party. |
| 2. |
to do away with by or as by authority; abolish; stop (a practice, custom, etc.). |
| 3. |
to keep in or repress (a feeling, smile, groan, etc.). |
| 4. |
to withhold from disclosure or publication (truth, evidence, a book, names, etc.). |
| 5. |
to stop or arrest (a flow, hemorrhage, cough, etc.). |
| 6. |
to vanquish or subdue (a revolt, rebellion, etc.); quell; crush. |
| 7. |
Electricity. to reduce or eliminate (an irregular or undesired oscillation or frequency) in a circuit. |
Oppress
| 1. |
to burden with cruel or unjust impositions or restraints; subject to a burdensome or harsh exercise of authority or power: a people oppressed by totalitarianism. |
| 2. |
to lie heavily upon (the mind, a person, etc.): Care and sorrow oppressed them. |
| 3. |
to weigh down, as sleep or weariness does. |
| 4. |
Archaic. to put down; subdue or suppress. |
| 5. |
Archaic. to press upon or against; crush. |
Repress
| 1. |
to keep under control, check, or suppress (desires, feelings, actions, tears, etc.). |
| 2. |
to keep down or suppress (anything objectionable). |
| 3. |
to put down or quell (sedition, disorder, etc.). |
| 4. |
to reduce (persons) to subjection. |
| 5. |
Psychoanalysis. to reject (painful or disagreeable ideas, memories, feelings, or impulses) from the conscious mind. |
–verb (used without object)
| 6. |
to initiate or undergo repression. |
Loks to me that each has an overweening CONCEPT--though all are from the same root, obviously.
- Suppress has the "hold back, hold down, stop" overtone.
- Oppress has the "weigh down, burden" overtone.
- Repress has the "control--and physical control" overtone.
Here's the thing--because of English's past--and I am specifically referring to the Norman COnquest here--it's become a language that readily picks up words from other languages. This has been both a delight and a trial--there's no point for Germans, for example, to do spelling bees, because the German language is absolutely consistent in spelling! But because English was suppressed by a linguistically repressive foreign oppressor for so long--wherein Latin and greek were the language of the educated class and French was the language of the ruling class--English was relegated to the peasantry, and became a linguistic magpie, picking up words from heaven only KNOWS where.
It means there are more ways to say any one concept, more possibloe ways to express fine shades of meaning in English than in any other language in the world. The vocabulary is VAST--and still growing, quite happily. So while the "press" gang you've brought up here ARE INDEED related, and you could use them fairly close to interchangeably? Someone with a feel for the language is going to use the connotations that each hold to pick exactly the right one under the circumstance.
I quote Mark Twain... The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between the lightning and the lightning bug.
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Sources: Dictionary.com and Heinz Woelk's "History of the English Language" class, WAY back in grad school. More years ago than I care to enumerate.
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Ah yes. The power of words...
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The words "suppress", "oppress", and "repress" definitely do have unique meanings, and are not really synonyms. As you can see below in the definitions from thefreedictionary.com, "suppress" is to curtail or end by force. "Oppress" is to keep down by force, but not end. "Repress" is to hold something back. While they are very similar, they definitely do have unique meanings! sup·press 1. To put an end to forcibly; subdue. 2. To curtail or prohibit the activities of. 3. To keep from being revealed, published, or circulated. 4. To deliberately exclude (unacceptable desires or thoughts) from the mind. 5. To inhibit the expression of (an impulse, for example); check: suppress a smile. 6. To reduce the incidence or severity of (a hemorrhage or cough, for example); arrest. op·press 1. To keep down by severe and unjust use of force or authority: a people who were oppressed by tyranny. 2. To weigh heavily on: Poverty oppresses the spirit. re·press 1. To hold back by an act of volition: couldn't repress a smirk. 2. To put down by force, usually before total control has been lost; quell: repress a rebellion.
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Sources: My opinion and thefreedictionary.com.
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and definitely not here. The following are my distinctions; others might have different ones:
oppress has only people as an object, suppress almost always mental activity, repress usually mental activity.
oppress implies pushing people down before they’ve risen up, repress implies keeping people from rising up.
repress implies keeping down a mental activity that has not yet been recognized as occurring subconsciously, suppress implies pushing back down an activity that has come to conscious attention.
i've tried to avoid being prescriptivist here.
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(*) the only ones i’m aware of are furze/gorse and talus/scree -- strangely, all have five letters!
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