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prism

Pronunciation: /ˈpɹɪz(ə)m/

The English word “prism” has 7 meanings listed here.

noun

  1. An object having the shape of a geometrical prism (sense 1).
  2. A cutting (“open passage at a level lower than the surrounding terrain, dug for a canal, railway, or road to go through”) or an embankment shaped like a prism (sense 1) or a number of prisms, such that its volume can be easily calculated.
  3. A crystal in which the faces are parallel to the vertical axis.
  4. A transparent block in the shape of a prism (sense 1), typically with triangular ends, used to reflect or refract light.
  5. A spectrum produced by light being refracted through a prism.
  6. A retroreflector (“device which reflects light back to its source with minimal scattering”) which is usually attached to a surveying pole as a target for a total station which emits a light beam at the device and calculates how long it takes to be reflected back in order to measure distance.
  7. A perspective that colours one's perception.

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Late Latin prisma (“(geometry) prism”), from Ancient Greek πρίσμᾰ (prísmă, “anything sawn; sawdust; (Koine, geometry) prism”), from πρῐ́ζω (prĭ́zō) (a variant of πρῑ́ω (prī́ō, “to saw”), further etymology unknown) + -μᾰ (-mă, suffix forming neuter nouns denoting the effect or result of an action, etc.).

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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.