abruptly

a printed punctuation mark (‽), available only in some typefaces, designed to combine the question mark (?) and the exclamation point (!), indicating a mixture of query and interjection, as after a rhetorical question.

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World English Dictionary

abrupt (əˈbrʌpt)

—*adj*
1.	sudden; unexpected
2.	brusque or brief in speech, manner, etc; curt
3.	(of a style of writing or speaking) making sharp transitions from one subject to another; disconnected
4.	precipitous; steep
5.	botany shaped as though a part has been cut off; truncate
6.	geology (of strata) cropping out suddenly

[C16: from Latin abruptus broken off, from ab-¹ + rumpere to break]

ab'ruptly

—*adv*

ab'ruptness

—n

abrupt (əˈbrʌpt)

—*adj*
1.	sudden; unexpected
2.	brusque or brief in speech, manner, etc; curt
3.	(of a style of writing or speaking) making sharp transitions from one subject to another; disconnected
4.	precipitous; steep
5.	botany shaped as though a part has been cut off; truncate
6.	geology (of strata) cropping out suddenly

[C16: from Latin abruptus broken off, from ab-¹ + rumpere to break]

ab'ruptly

—*adv*

ab'ruptness

—n

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

abrupt

1580s, from L. abruptus "broken off, precipitous, disconnected," pp. of abrumpere "break off," from ab- "off" + rumpere "break" (see rupture). Related: Abruptly.

Example sentences

Indeed this prehistoric stage of education ended rather abruptly with his tenth

year.

After five months and little agreement, the editors abruptly ended the debate.

In addition, rich economies look set to slow down-perhaps uncomfortably

abruptly.

The inhabitants apparently left abruptly, without carrying away valuable goods

such as pottery or baskets.

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Matching Quote

"The secret affinity between gambling and the desert: the intensity of gambling reinforced by the presence of the desert all around the town. The air-conditioned freshness of the gaming rooms, as against the radiant heat outside. The challenge of all the artificial lights to the violence of the sun's rays. Night of gambling sunlit on all sides; the glittering darkness of these rooms in the middle of the desert. Gambling itself is a desert form, inhuman, uncultured, initiatory, a challenge to the natural economy of value, a crazed activity on the fringes of exchange. But it too has a strict limit and stops abruptly; its boundaries are exact, its passion knows no confusion. Neither the desert nor gambling are open areas; their spaces are finite and concentric, increasing in intensity toward the interior, toward a central point, be it the spirit of gambling or the heart of the desert—a privileged, immemorial space, where things lose their shadow, where money loses its value, and where the extreme rarity of traces of what signals to us there leads men to seek the instantaneity of wealth."

-Jean Baudrillard