terror
American Heritage Dictionary:
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ter·ror
(tĕr'ər) 
n.
n.
- Intense, overpowering fear. See synonyms at fear.
- One that instills intense fear: a rabid dog that became the terror of the neighborhood.
- The ability to instill intense fear: the terror of jackboots pounding down the street.
- Violence committed or threatened by a group to intimidate or coerce a population, as for military or political purposes.
- Informal. An annoying or intolerable pest: that little terror of a child.
[Middle English terrour, from Old French terreur, from Latin terror, from terrēre, to frighten.]
Roget's Thesaurus:
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terror
noun
- Great agitation and anxiety caused by the expectation or the realization of danger: affright, alarm, apprehension, dread, fear, fearfulness, fright, funk, horror, panic, trepidation. Slang cold feet. Idioms: fear and trembling. See fear/courage.
Antonyms by Answers.com:
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terror
n
Definition: intense fear
Antonyms: cheer, glee, happiness, joy, peace
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The specific fear that some evil event or action is going to occur. Its origins go back to the notion of trembling. Strictly speaking, it should be distinguished from horror, in that horror implies something disgusting and negative, whereas terror does not.
In the field of myth, terror has often been associated with visitations from an all-powerful god controlling life and death in a seemingly indiscriminate manner. The Delphic oracle went into a kind of trance or frenzy, during which the awesome god spoke through the prophetess. All this, even the ambiguities of the prophecies themselves, was designed to inspire fear of the god in the onlookers.
Terror appears to fit into the category of instinct response which humans share with most animals. For example, most humans and animals fear the sight of mutilated bodies. Experiments with chimpanzees during which the animals were shown pictures of chimpanzees with their heads or limbs cut off elicited instinctive responses of extreme trepidation. This fear of violence done to the body is at the basis of the terror process.
In the ancient world terror was the basis of tyranny, as in Rome under Marius and Sulla. Historically many political leaders have chosen to rule by terror tactics rather than customary, legal means — that is, by the systematic use of violence to inhibit political opposition. Present-day 'acts of terrorism' bear a different sense, as they are designed to disrupt a given system by violent actions.
While the causes of terror have changed over the centuries, the human mind continues to be highly susceptible to it. Our ancestors gathered round lighted fires not only to keep warm but to ward off 'the terror by night': there were terrifying animals lurking in the darkness. The 'night light' in a child's room reflects this fear of darkness, of the unseen and the unknown. Even so, most humans seem to enjoy the feeling of terror under controlled conditions. Grandmothers have traditionally told tales of terror around the fireplace to countless generations of children, in a role which today has been supplanted by the so-called horror film. Perhaps the monsters who march across the screen are designed to purge the real monsters within the human psyche. (See Frankenstein.)
Contemporary science and technology have created new sources of terror, such as the threat of nuclear annihilation and highly sophisticated means of electronic surveillance and control of human behaviour. Modern adult human beings may no longer fear the presence of huge animals in the darkness, but most humans experience terror born from technology.
(Published 1987)
In the field of myth, terror has often been associated with visitations from an all-powerful god controlling life and death in a seemingly indiscriminate manner. The Delphic oracle went into a kind of trance or frenzy, during which the awesome god spoke through the prophetess. All this, even the ambiguities of the prophecies themselves, was designed to inspire fear of the god in the onlookers.
Terror appears to fit into the category of instinct response which humans share with most animals. For example, most humans and animals fear the sight of mutilated bodies. Experiments with chimpanzees during which the animals were shown pictures of chimpanzees with their heads or limbs cut off elicited instinctive responses of extreme trepidation. This fear of violence done to the body is at the basis of the terror process.
In the ancient world terror was the basis of tyranny, as in Rome under Marius and Sulla. Historically many political leaders have chosen to rule by terror tactics rather than customary, legal means — that is, by the systematic use of violence to inhibit political opposition. Present-day 'acts of terrorism' bear a different sense, as they are designed to disrupt a given system by violent actions.
While the causes of terror have changed over the centuries, the human mind continues to be highly susceptible to it. Our ancestors gathered round lighted fires not only to keep warm but to ward off 'the terror by night': there were terrifying animals lurking in the darkness. The 'night light' in a child's room reflects this fear of darkness, of the unseen and the unknown. Even so, most humans seem to enjoy the feeling of terror under controlled conditions. Grandmothers have traditionally told tales of terror around the fireplace to countless generations of children, in a role which today has been supplanted by the so-called horror film. Perhaps the monsters who march across the screen are designed to purge the real monsters within the human psyche. (See Frankenstein.)
Contemporary science and technology have created new sources of terror, such as the threat of nuclear annihilation and highly sophisticated means of electronic surveillance and control of human behaviour. Modern adult human beings may no longer fear the presence of huge animals in the darkness, but most humans experience terror born from technology.
(Published 1987)
— Raymond T. McNally
Word Tutor:
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terror
IN BRIEF: n. - An overwhelming feeling of fear and anxiety.
If thunder itself was to be continual, it would excite no more terror than the noise of a mill.
— A. Kingston
LearnThatWord.com is a free vocabulary and spelling program where you only pay for results!
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categories related to 'terror'
- Behavior or Personality
- Violent Persons - terror: Informal. wildly uncontrollable person
See crossword solutions for the clue Wikipedia on Answers.com:
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Terror
This article is about the historical and political concept. For other uses, see Terror (disambiguation).
Terror, from French terreur, from Latin terror meaning "great fear", a noun derived from the Latin verb terrere meaning "to frighten",[1] is a policy of political repression and violence intended to subdue political opposition. The term was first used for the Reign of Terror imposed by the Jacobins during the French Revolution.[2][3] Modern instances of terror include red terror or white terror.
Before the advent of modern terrorism, the term "terrorism" in the English language was sometimes used interchangeable with terror. The modern definition of terrorism refers to criminal or illegal acts of violence at randomly chosen targets, in an effort to raise fear. It is practiced by extremist groups with a limited political base or parties on the weaker side in asymmetric warfare. Terror on the other hand is practiced by governments and law enforcement officials, usually within the legal framework of the state.
Revolutionary and counter-revolutionary terror
Main article: Revolutionary terror
Revolutionary terror, also known as "red terror", was often used by revolutionary governments to suppress counterrevolutionaries. The first example was the Reign of Terror during the French Revolution in 1794.[4][5] Other notable examples include the Red Terror in Soviet Russia in 1918–1922, as well as simultaneous campaigns in the Hungarian Soviet Republic and in Finland. In China Red Terror in 1966 and 1967 started the Cultural revolution.
Counterrevolutionary terror is usually referred to as "white terror". Notable examples are the terror campaigns in France (1794–1795), in Russia (1917–20), in Hungary (1919–1921), and in Spain. Modern examples of counter-revolutionary terror include Operation Condor in South America.
Terror and terrorism
David Forte states that the primary difference between terror and terrorism is that while terror can be neutrally evil, i.e. random violence committed by robbers, rapists and even soldiers, terrorism has the additional political or moral dimension, being the systemised use of randomly focused violence by organised groups against civilian targets to effect a political objective.[6]
However Charles Tilly defines "terror" as a political strategy defined as "asymmetrical deployment of threats and violence against enemies using means that fall outside the forms of political struggle routinely operating within some current regime", and therefore ranges from[7]:
- intermittent actions by members of groups that are engaged in wider political struggles to
- one segment in the modus operandi of durably organized specialists in coercion, including government-employed and government-backed specialists in coercion to
- the dominant rationale for distinct, committed groups and networks of activists.
According to Tilly, the term "terror" spans across a wide range of human cruelties, from Stalin's use of executions to clandestine attacks by groups like the Basque separatists and the IRA and even ethnic cleansing and genocide[8]
References
- ^ Harper, Douglas. "terror". Online Etymology Dictionary. http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=terror.
- ^ Kim Campbell (September 27, 2001). "When is 'terrorist' a subjective term?". Christian Science Monitor. http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/0927/p16s2-wogi.html. Retrieved 2010-01-11. "New York Times columnist William Safire wrote that the word "terrorist" has its roots in the Latin terrere, which means "to frighten.""
- ^ Geoffrey Nunberg (October 28, 2001). "Head Games / It All Started with Robespierre / "Terrorism": The history of a very frightening word". San Francisco Chronicle. http://articles.sfgate.com/2001-10-28/opinion/17622543_1_terrorism-robespierre-la-terreur. Retrieved 2010-01-11. "In 1792 the Jacobins came to power in France and initiated what we call the Reign of Terror and what the French call simply La Terreur."
- ^ "Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy", by Barrington Moore, Edward Friedman, James C. Scott (1993) ISBN 0-8070-5073-3, p.101: "Social Consequences of Revolutionary Terror"
- ^ French revolutionary terror was a gross exaggeration, say Lafayette experts. By Chandni Navalkha. April 28, 2008. accessed 5-20-2009
- ^ Forte, David F. (1986). "Terror and Terrorism: There Is a Difference". Ohio Northern University Law Review (Ohio Northern University Pettit College of Law) 13: 39–52. http://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?collection=journals&handle=hein.journals/onulr13&div=13&id=&page=.
- ^ Charles Tilly. Terror, Terrorism, Terrorists. Sociological Theory, Vol. 22, No. 1, Theories of Terrorism: A Symposium (Mar., 2004), pp. 5-13
- ^ Tilly, p9
This entry is from Wikipedia, the leading user-contributed encyclopedia. It may not have been reviewed by professional editors (see full disclaimer)
Translations:
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Terror
Nederlands (Dutch)
schrik, verschrikking
Français (French)
n. - terreur, (Hist) la Terreur
Deutsch (German)
n. - Angst, Schrecken, Terror
Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - τρόμος, φόβος, φρίκη, δέος, τρομοκρατία
Italiano (Italian)
terrore, spavento, orrore
Português (Portuguese)
n. - terror (m)
Русский (Russian)
террор, страх, ужас
Español (Spanish)
n. - terror, espanto, sobresalto, susto, horror, pánico, atrocidad
Svenska (Swedish)
n. - terror, skräck, fasa
中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
恐怖, 恐怖时期, 可怕的人
中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 恐怖, 恐怖時期, 可怕的人
한국어 (Korean)
n. - 공포, 지긋 지긋한 녀석, 테러 집단
日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 恐怖, 恐ろしさ, 恐怖政治, テロ, 大変な厄介物, 厄介者
العربيه (Arabic)
(الاسم) ذعر, رعب
עברית (Hebrew)
n. - פחד, אימה, טרור, חבלה
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