Phrase guide
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
Sound
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noun
A story which supposedly explains the beginning or early development of a current state of affairs; a myth, a pourquoi story.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
A story, especially one for children, featuring animals as characters.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Topics: literature, media, publishing
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
noun
An untestable explanation for something, such as a form of behaviour, a biological trait, or a cultural practice.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Usage: derogatory, especially
Topics: anthropology, human-sciences, philosophy, sciences, social-science, social-sciences
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: none provided
Antonyms: none provided
History
PIE word *swé From just so (“(almost) exactly or precisely like something”, adjective) + story, referring to the series of short stories called Just So Stories (collected in book form in 1902) by the English writer Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) which described how various animals acquired their distinctive characteristics, such as how the leopard got its spots. According to Kipling, the stories were so titled because they were intended to put his daughter Josephine (“Effie”) to sleep, “and you were not allowed to alter those by one single little word. They had to be told just so; or Effie would wake up and put back the missing sentence.”
Across languages
9 source translations are retained for this English entry.
