imitate - Definitions from Dictionary.com

5 results for: imitate

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This

im·i·tate

Audio Help [im-i-teyt] Pronunciation Key

–verb (used with object), -tat·ed, -tat·ing.

1.	to follow or endeavor to follow as a model or example: to imitate an author's style; to imitate an older brother.

2.	to mimic; impersonate: The students imitated the teacher behind her back.

3.	to make a copy of; reproduce closely.

4.	to have or assume the appearance of; simulate; resemble.

[Origin: 1525–35; < L imitātus ptp. of imitārī to copy, presumably a freq. akin to the base of imāgō image

]

—Related forms

im·i·ta·tor, noun

—Synonyms 2. ape, mock. 3. Imitate, copy, duplicate, reproduce all mean to follow or try to follow an example or pattern. Imitate is the general word for the idea: to imitate someone's handwriting, behavior. To copy is to make a fairly exact imitation of an original creation: to copy a sentence, a dress, a picture. To duplicate is to produce something that exactly resembles or corresponds to something else; both may be originals: to duplicate the terms of two contracts. To reproduce is to make a likeness or reconstruction of an original: to reproduce a 16th-century theater.

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
imitate

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American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

im·i·tate Audio Help (ĭm'ĭ-tāt') Pronunciation Key
tr.v. im·i·tat·ed, im·i·tat·ing, im·i·tates

To use or follow as a model.
1. To copy the actions, appearance, mannerisms, or speech of; mimic: amused friends by imitating the teachers.
2. To copy or use the style of: brushwork that imitates Rembrandt.
To copy exactly; reproduce.
To appear like; resemble.

[Latin imitārī, imitāt-; see aim- in Indo-European roots.]

im'i·ta'tor n.

Synonyms: These verbs mean to follow something or someone taken as a model. To imitate is to act like or follow a pattern or style set by another: "Art imitates Nature" (Richard Franck).
To copy is to duplicate an original as precisely as possible: "His grandfather had spent a laborious life-time in Rome, copying the Old Masters for a generation which lacked the facile resource of the camera" (Edith Wharton).
To mimic is to make a close imitation, often with an intent to ridicule: "fresh carved cedar, mimicking a glade/Of palm and plaintain" (John Keats).
To ape is to follow another's lead slavishly but often with an absurd result: "Those [superior] states of mind do not come from aping an alien culture" (John Russell).
To parody is either to imitate with comic effect or to attempt a serious imitation and fail: "All these peculiarities [of Samuel Johnson's literary style] have been imitated by his admirers and parodied by his assailants" (Thomas Macaulay).
To simulate is to feign or falsely assume the appearance or character of something: "I ... lay there simulating death" (W.H. Hudson).

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The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This

imitate
verb
1.	reproduce someone's behavior or looks; "The mime imitated the passers-by"; "Children often copy their parents or older siblings"
2.	appear like, as in behavior or appearance; "Life imitate art"
3.	make a reproduction or copy of

Kernerman English Multilingual Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
imitate [ˈimiteit] verb

to (try to) be, behave or look the same as (a person etc)
Example: Children imitate their friends rather than their parents; He could imitate the song of many different birds.

Arabic:	يُحاكي، يُقَلِّد
Chinese (Simplified):	模仿
Chinese (Traditional):	模仿
Czech:	napodobit
Danish:	imitere; efterligne
Dutch:	nabootsen
Estonian:	matkima
Finnish:	jäljitellä
French:	imiter
German:	nachahmen
Greek:	μιμούμαι
Hungarian:	utánoz
Icelandic:	líkja eftir
Indonesian:	meniru
Italian:	imitare

Japanese:	まねる
Korean:	흉내내다
Latvian:	imitēt, atdarināt
Lithuanian:	pamėgdžioti, imituoti
Norwegian:	etterlikne, imitere
Polish:	naśladować
Portuguese (Brazil):	imitar
Portuguese (Portugal):	imitar
Romanian:	a imita
Russian:	подражать
Slovak:	napodobniť
Slovenian:	posnemati
Spanish:	imitar
Swedish:	efterlikna, ta efter, härma, imitera
Turkish:	taklit etmek

See also: imitator, imitation

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Imitate

Im"age\, n. [F., fr. L. imago, imaginis, from the root of imitari to imitate. See Imitate, and cf. Imagine.]

1. An imitation, representation, or similitude of any person, thing, or act, sculptured, drawn, painted, or otherwise made perceptible to the sight; a visible presentation; a copy; a likeness; an effigy; a picture; a semblance.

Even like a stony image, cold and numb. --Shak.

Whose is this image and superscription? --Matt. xxii. 20.

This play is the image of a murder done in Vienna. --Shak.

And God created man in his own image. --Gen. i. 27.

2. Hence: The likeness of anything to which worship is paid; an idol. --Chaucer.

Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, . . . thou shalt not bow down thyself to them. --Ex. xx. 4, 5.

3. Show; appearance; cast.

The face of things a frightful image bears. --Dryden.

4. A representation of anything to the mind; a picture drawn by the fancy; a conception; an idea.

Can we conceive Image of aught delightful, soft, or great? --Prior.

5. (Rhet.) A picture, example, or illustration, often taken from sensible objects, and used to illustrate a subject; usually, an extended metaphor. --Brande & C.

6. (Opt.) The figure or picture of any object formed at the focus of a lens or mirror, by rays of light from the several points of the object symmetrically refracted or reflected to corresponding points in such focus; this may be received on a screen, a photographic plate, or the retina of the eye, and viewed directly by the eye, or with an eyeglass, as in the telescope and microscope; the likeness of an object formed by reflection; as, to see one's image in a mirror.

Electrical image. See under Electrical.

Image breaker, one who destroys images; an iconoclast.

Image graver, Image maker, a sculptor.

Image worship, the worship of images as symbols; iconolatry distinguished from idolatry; the worship of images themselves.

Image Purkinje (Physics), the image of the retinal blood vessels projected in, not merely on, that membrane.

Virtual image (Optics), a point or system of points, on one side of a mirror or lens, which, if it existed, would emit the system of rays which actually exists on the other side of the mirror or lens. --Clerk Maxwell.

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