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pronounce WAIVE: Say it "WAVE." To hear it, click here. connect this word to others: When I take my daughter to the trampoline park, I sign a waiver for us both, specifically a waiver of liability. I'm effectively telling the park, "If we injure ourselves, I've given away my right to hold you responsible." If you're signing a waiver like that, or otherwise waiving your rights to something, you might imagine it as a kind of waving away of your rights: "Yeah, yeah, take them, I don't need them, off they go, whoosh." In other words, to be waiving something is to be yielding it, relinquishing it, handing it over, d_____sing with it. Can you recall that last word? (To reveal any word with blanks, give it a click.) definition: Let's start with the word "waif," which comes to us through French and can mean "a stray animal, or a lost or abandoned piece of property." This "waif" might trace back to a Scandinavian word that literally means "something waving or flapping in the wind." (I suspect there was some onomatopoeia at work, but I can't prove it.) In Old French, a word meaning "to become a waif, or to abandon" trickled into English as our word "waive," which first meant "to outlaw someone: to abandon them officially by taking away their protection under the law." To leave them flapping in the wind, basically, like a piece of unclaimed property. "Waive" took on other meanings in English related to abandonment and legal proceedings, which leads us to the meaning we use today. To waive something is to officially or legally give up your claim on it: to get rid of it, or to officially say that you don't require it. grammatical bits: Part of speech: Verb, the transitive kind: "They'll waive the fee for you this time;" "He waived his right to a lawyer." Other forms:  There's "waived" and "waiving." And "waivers," the documents that do the waiving. how to use it: Pick the formal, common word "waive" when you need to strike a serious tone, especially in a legal context. Talk about people waiving their rights to certain things: "He waived his right to a hearing;" "She waived her Miranda Rights;" "They waived their right to appeal the verdict." Or, talk about people or groups waiving their typical rules, fees, requirements, or penalties in certain situations. "There's a tropical storm coming, so if you need to change your flight, the airline is waiving the fee for that." "The wine tasting is $20 per person, but they waive it if you buy one of their bottles." examples: "The National Park Service, which celebrates its centennial this year, is waiving admission fees during National Park Week."    — Carol Sottili and Andrea Sachs, Washington Post, 31 March 2016 "The [opera] company did have to cancel one of its biggest fund-raisers of the year, the Opera Ball... while it was offering refunds, the opera hoped that patrons would waive the refund as a way to support its educational programs."     — Michael Cooper and Alex Marshall, New York Times, 10 March 2020 has this page helped you understand "waive"? Awesome, I'm glad it helped! Thanks for letting me know! If you have any questions about this word, please message me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com. study it: Explain the meaning of "waive" without saying "surrender" or "sign away." try it out: I'm excited every year, as schools are starting up again, when the government waives sales tax on school supplies. It makes a special shopping ritual feel even more special. I'm less excited when a museum offers to waive its entry fees on a particular day. The resulting crowds would be too much for me. With these examples in mind, talk about a time you were enticed, or unenticed, by the offer of a waived fee. My examples involved shopping and sightseeing; yours might involve sports, travel, utilities, dining, reading, adventuring, attending a performance, joining a club, enrolling in a class or service, etc. If you like, use this space to write. (To save your work, copy and paste it into an email or a document.) before you review, play: Try to spend 20 seconds or more on the game below. Don’t skip straight to the review—first, let your working memory empty out. Our game for September is "Four Quick Ways to Wreck a Sentence: From Professionally Polished to Strategically Sabotaged." In each issue this month, compare two versions of a description of a popular movie. See if you can determine which is the real one (the professionally polished version from IMDB.com) and which is the fake one (the strategically sabotaged version from yours truly). The fake one will demonstrate one of the four quick ways to wreck a sentence, listed below. So, for an extra challenge, see if you can identify which of these four has been employed in the act of sabotage. Here are the four quick ways to wreck a sentence: 1. Make the details fuzzier or fewer. 2. Jumble the order of information, forcing the reader to slow down or back up. 3. Ruin the rhythm by breaking a pattern in a pair or list. 4. Make the whole thing a chore to read by swapping in a subject that's long or abstract, and/or a verb that's vague or passive. Make it even worse by pushing the subject and the verb really far away from each other. (Naturally, if you invert each item above, you get Four Quick Ways to Strengthen a Sentence.) Here's an example: Version A: "The Shawshank Redemption: Two imprisoned men bond over a number of years, finding solace and eventual redemption through acts of common decency." Version B: "The Shawshank Redemption: Two imprisoned men bond over a number of years, finding eventual redemption and solace through acts of common decency." Which is real, and which is fake? And in the fake one, which of the four quick ways to wreck a sentence have I employed? Answer: A is real; B is fake. The fake was created with #2, "Jumble the order of information." Readers find it easier to process information when it's in a logical or chronological order, and when they can start with the shorter, simpler words and phrases before moving on to the longer, more complex ones. Here, it's better to write "solace and eventual redemption" instead of "eventual redemption and solace," for three reasons. One, the characters in the story probably achieve solace before they achieve redemption; two, solace as a concept is less intense and less abstract than redemption; and three, "solace" is many syllables shorter than "eventual redemption." Try this one today: Version A: "The Godfather: An organized crime dynasty's aging patriarch transfers control of his clandestine empire to his reluctant son." Version B: "The Godfather: An organized crime dynasty's aging patriarch transfers to his reluctant son the control of his clandestine empire." Which is real, and which is fake? And in the fake one, which of the four quick ways to wreck a sentence have I employed? To see the answers, scroll all the way down. review this word: 1. The opposite of WAIVE could be A. CREST or RISE UP. B. CLAIM or INSIST ON. C. BECKON or URGE FORTH. 2. I've found that a reasonable request, made politely, can waive almost any _____. A. exorbitant fee B. intrusive question C. obnoxious passenger Answers to review questions: 1. B 2. A Answers to the game question: A is real; B is fake. The fake was also created with #2, "Jumble the order of information." Here, it's better to allow the most interesting, most surprising bit of information to end the sentence with a bang. And the surprising bit is the fact that the son doesn't really want the empire. That's more interesting, and more important, than the fact that the patriarch's empire or dynasty is clandestine or secret, which, duh. The very end of a sentence will amplify whatever tidbit of information we put there, and readers will hear that tidbit echoing in their minds. So, we should make it count. a final word: I hope you're enjoying Make Your Point. It's made with love. I'm Liesl Johnson, a reading and writing tutor on a mission to explore, illuminate, and celebrate words. From my blog: On vocabulary...       36 ways to study words.       Why we forget words, & how to remember them.       How to use sophisticated words without being awkward. On writing...       How to improve any sentence.       How to motivate our kids to write.       How to stop procrastinating and start writing.       How to bulk up your writing when you have to meet a word count. To be a sponsor and include your ad in an issue, please contact me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com. Disclaimer: When I write definitions, I use plain language and stick to the words' common, useful applications. If you're interested in authoritative and multiple definitions of words, I encourage you to check a dictionary. Also, because I'm American, I stick to American English when I share words' meanings, usage, and pronunciations; these elements sometimes vary across world Englishes.