acoustics

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From acoustic +‎ -s.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /əˈkuː.stɪks/
  • Audio:(file)

Noun

acoustics (uncountable) See -ics regarding the treatment of such nouns as singular.

  2. (physics) The science of sounds, teaching their nature, phenomena and laws.
    • 1831, John Herschel, Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy, London: Printed for Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown, & Green: Paternoster Row, and John Taylor, Upper Gower Street, page 248:
      "Acoustics, then, or the science of sound, is a very consderable branch of physics, and one which has been cultivated from the earliest ages.
  3. The properties of a space that affect how sound carries.
    The acoustics in the opera house gave the whole concert a spooky sound.

Usage notes

  • The science was previously divided by some writers into diacoustics, which explains the properties of sounds coming directly from (sic! Webster) the ear; and catacoustics, which treats of reflected sounds or echoes. This division is now obsolete.

Derived terms

Translations

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Translations to be checked

Noun

acoustics

  1. plural of acoustic

References

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