negotiate

English

WOTD – 21 February 2007

Alternative forms

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin negotiatus, past participle of negotiari (to carry on business), from negotium (business) (Eng. usg. 1599), from nec (not) + otium (leisure, ease, inactivity).

Pronunciation

  • (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /nəˈɡəʊ.ʃi.eɪt/, /nɪˈɡoʊ.ʃi.eɪt/, /nɪˈɡəʊ.si.eɪt/
  • (US) IPA(key): /nəˈɡoʊ.ʃi.eɪt/, /nɪˈɡoʊ.ʃi.eɪt/
  • (file)
  • (General Australian) IPA(key): /nɪˈɡəʉ.ʃi.æɪt/, (uncommon) /nɪˈɡəʉ.si.æɪt/
  • (file)

Verb

negotiate (third-person singular simple present negotiates, present participle negotiating, simple past and past participle negotiated)

  1. (intransitive) To confer with others in order to come to terms or reach an agreement.
    • 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr., to the eight fellow clergymen who opposed the civil rights action, "Letter from Birmingham Jail," Why We Can't Wait
      "You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue."
  2. (transitive) To arrange or settle something by mutual agreement.
    • 2013 July 19, Timothy Garton Ash, “Where Dr Pangloss meets Machiavelli”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 6, page 18:
      Hidden behind thickets of acronyms and gorse bushes of detail, a new great game is under way across the globe. [] The current power play consists of an extraordinary range of countries simultaneously sitting down to negotiate big free trade and investment agreements.
    We negotiated the contract to everyone's satisfaction.
    The client and server computers must first negotiate a network protocol to be used.
  3. (transitive) To succeed in coping with, or getting over something.
    We negotiated the mountain track with difficulty.
    Although the car was quite rickety, he could negotiate the curves very well.
  4. (transitive) To transfer to another person with all the rights of the original holder; to pass, as a bill.
  5. (obsolete) To transact business; to carry on trade.
  6. (obsolete) To intrigue; to scheme.

Derived terms

Translations

Further reading

Latin

Pronunciation

Participle

negōtiāte

  1. vocative masculine singular of negōtiātus
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