hyperventilate
English
Etymology
Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *úp
Proto-Indo-European *-er
Proto-Indo-European *upér
Proto-Hellenic *(h)upér
Ancient Greek ῠ̔πέρ (hŭpér)
English hyper-
English hyperventilate
Pronunciation
Audio (Southern England): (file)
Verb
hyperventilate (third-person singular simple present hyperventilates, present participle hyperventilating, simple past and past participle hyperventilated)
- (intransitive) To breathe quickly and deeply, especially at an abnormally rapid rate.
- 1981 April 15, Ira Berkow, “DRAMA IN 'STENGELESE: YOU CAN LOOK IT UP”, in The New York Times[1], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 19 December 2024:
- When I tried it, I hyperventilated.
- 1988 October 2, James Atlas, “DABBLING IN LOVE - NOT THE NICE KIND”, in The New York Times[2], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 27 November 2023:
- Sometimes her prose hyperventilates ("Once, years ago, his and N.'s love for each other had glowed like phosphorescent fire on the surfaces of their bodies"), and she has a weakness for epiphanies ("There was a man, no longer young, though not yet old, who, traveling alone in northern Europe, began to feel that his soul was being drained slowly, almost secretly from him, drop by drop").
- 2020 June 15, Eva Holland, “In a Crisis, We Can Learn From Trauma Therapy”, in The New York Times[3], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 25 July 2025:
- Sometimes on the highway I had to pull over to hyperventilate and sob.
- 2024 August 19, Paul Krugman, “Kamalanomics, Revealed: A Solid Center-Left Agenda”, in The New York Times[4], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 3 October 2025:
- Even some middle-of-the-road economic commentators have been hyperventilating, saying that she’s essentially calling for price controls, which is odd, because she didn’t say anything like that.
Synonyms
Related terms
Translations
to breathe quickly and deeply
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Categories:
- English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European word *h₂wéh₁n̥ts
- English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European root *h₂weh₁-
- English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European word *upér
- English terms derived from the Proto-Indo-European word *h₂wḗh₁ti
- English terms prefixed with hyper-
- English terms with audio pronunciation
- English lemmas
- English verbs
- English intransitive verbs
- English terms with quotations