professional

From Middle English professhennalle, professhynalle; equivalent to profession +‎ -al.

• IPA^(key): /pɹəˈfɛʃənəl/

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professional (plural professionals)

1. A person who belongs to a profession.
2. A person who earns their living from a specified activity.
3. (euphemistic) A prostitute.

   There was this nice lady who flirted with me at the bar, but it turned out that she was a professional.

4. A reputation known by name.
5. An expert.
   • 1934, Rex Stout, Fer-de-Lance, Bantam, published 1992, →ISBN, page 97:

     I have learned that there is a person attached to a golf club called a professional. Find out who fills that post at the Green Meadow Club; […] invite the professional, urgently, to dine with us this evening.

6. One of four categories of sociologist propounded by Horowitz: a sociologist who is actively concerned with promoting the profession of sociology.

professional (comparative more professional, superlative most professional)

1. Of, pertaining to, or in accordance with the (usually high) standards of a profession.
   • 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter II, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:

     His forefathers had been, as a rule, professional men—physicians and lawyers; his grandfather died under the walls of Chapultepec Castle while twisting a tourniquet for a cursing dragoon; an uncle remained indefinitely at Malvern Hill; […].

   • 2019 March 18, Steven Pifer, Five years after Crimea’s illegal annexation, the issue is no closer to resolution‎, The Center for International Security and Cooperation:

     The little green men were clearly professional soldiers by their bearing, carried Russian weapons, and wore Russian combat fatigues, but they had no identifying insignia. Vladimir Putin originally denied they were Russian soldiers; that April, he confirmed they were.

2. That is carried out for money, especially as a livelihood.
3. (by extension) Expert.

From professió +‎ -al.

• IPA^(key): (Central) [pɾu.fə.si.uˈnal]
• IPA^(key): (Balearic) [pɾo.fə.si.oˈnal]
• IPA^(key): (Valencian) [pɾo.fe.si.oˈnal]
• Rhymes: -al

professional m or f (masculine and feminine plural professionals)

1. professional

• professionalisme
• professionalment

professional m or f by sense (plural professionals)

1. professional

• “professional” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “professional”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2024
• “professional” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “professional” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

From English professional.

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professional m (plural professionals)

1. a professional practitioner of a trade, métier...
2. an expert in a (professional) field

• professionalism n