COUNTRY-DANCE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does country-dance mean? 

• COUNTRY-DANCE (noun)
  The noun COUNTRY-DANCE has 1 sense:

1. a type of folk dance in which couples are arranged in sets or face one another in a line

  Familiarity information: COUNTRY-DANCE used as a noun is very rare.

• COUNTRY-DANCE (verb)
  The verb COUNTRY-DANCE has 1 sense:

1. perform a contradance

  Familiarity information: COUNTRY-DANCE used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• COUNTRY-DANCE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A type of folk dance in which couples are arranged in sets or face one another in a line

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

contra danse; contradance; contredanse; country-dance; country dancing

Hypernyms ("country-dance" is a kind of...):

folk dance; folk dancing (a style of dancing that originated among ordinary people (not in the royal courts))

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "country-dance"):

longways; longways dance (country dancing performed with couples in two long lines facing each other)

square dance; square dancing (American country dancing in which couples form squares)

do-si-do (a square-dance figure; two dancers approach each other and circle back to back before returning to their original places)

promenade (a square dance figure; couples march counterclockwise in a circle)

sashay (a square dance figure; partners circle each other taking sideways steps)

swing (a square dance figure; a pair of dancers join hands and dance around a point between them)

landler (a moderately slow Austrian country dance in triple time; involves spinning and clapping)

Derivation:

country-dance (perform a contradance)

• COUNTRY-DANCE (verb)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Perform a contradance

Classified under:

Verbs of walking, flying, swimming

Synonyms:

contra danse; contradance; contredanse; country-dance

Hypernyms (to "country-dance" is one way to...):

dance; trip the light fantastic; trip the light fantastic toe (move in a pattern; usually to musical accompaniment; do or perform a dance)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Sentence example:

Sam and Sue country-dance

Derivation:

country-dance (a type of folk dance in which couples are arranged in sets or face one another in a line)

 Context examples 

I think Miss Fairfax dances very well; and Mrs. Weston is the very best country-dance player, without exception, in England.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

I consider a country-dance as an emblem of marriage.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

Advise was his word, but it was the advice of absolute power, and she had only to rise, and, with Mr. Crawford's very cordial adieus, pass quietly away; stopping at the entrance-door, like the Lady of Branxholm Hall, one moment and no more, to view the happy scene, and take a last look at the five or six determined couple who were still hard at work; and then, creeping slowly up the principal staircase, pursued by the ceaseless country-dance, feverish with hopes and fears, soup and negus, sore-footed and fatigued, restless and agitated, yet feeling, in spite of everything, that a ball was indeed delightful.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)