licence

/'laisəns/

Thân thiện

A driver holds up his new driver's licence after passing the test.

Definition

1. Noun:

   • Official permission: A formal authorization granted by a competent authority, often documented, allowing someone to do something that would otherwise be prohibited.
   • A document proving such permission: A physical or legal certificate that serves as evidence of this official authorization.
   • Freedom to act without restraint: The liberty to behave in a way that deviates from usual rules or conventions, often implying excessive or irresponsible freedom.

2. Verb:

   • To grant official permission: To give formal authorization, typically by issuing a legal document, allowing a person or entity to perform a specific activity.

Usage Examples

• Noun:

  • You need a licence to operate a television station. (Official permission)
  • He showed his driving licence to the police officer. (Document proving permission)
  • The film was criticized for its licence in depicting violence. (Excessive freedom)

• Verb:

  • The government agency will licence the new pharmaceutical drug.
  • This restaurant is licensed to sell alcohol.

Advanced Usage

• "Poetic licence": The freedom allowed to artists, especially writers, to deviate from standard facts, rules, or conventions for creative effect.

  • The author used poetic licence to alter the historical timeline for dramatic impact.

• "A licence to print money" (Idiom): Refers to a business or activity that guarantees large, easy profits, often with little effort.

  • That government contract is essentially a licence to print money.

Variants and Related Words

• License: The preferred spelling for both noun and verb forms in American English. The word "licence" is primarily used in British, Canadian, and other Commonwealth English for the noun, while "license" is the verb.
• Licenser/Licensor (noun): The entity that grants a licence.
• Licensee (noun): The person or entity that receives or holds a licence.
• Licentious (adjective): Behaving in a sexually immoral or socially irresponsible way, stemming from the "excessive freedom" meaning.

Synonyms

• Noun (for permission): Permit, authorization, certification, warrant.
• Noun (for freedom): Liberty, latitude, indulgence.
• Verb: Authorize, certify, permit, sanction.

Related Phrases and Phrasal Verbs

• License out: To grant permission to another party to use one's property, such as a patent or trademark.
  • The company decided to license out its software to international partners.

Related Idioms

• Take liberties / a licence with something: To treat something without the proper respect or adherence to rules, often changing it.
  • The director took considerable licence with the original novel's plot.
• Under licence: Operating or produced with formal permission from the owner.
  • The toys are manufactured under licence from the film studio.

Học thuật

Noun

1. a legal document giving official permission to do something
2. freedom to deviate deliberately from normally applicable rules or practices (especially in behavior or speech)
3. excessive freedom; lack of due restraint
   • when liberty becomes license dictatorship is near- Will Durant
   • the intolerable license with which the newspapers break...the rules of decorum- Edmund Burke

Verb

1. authorize officially
   • I am licensed to practice law in this state

Từ đồng nghĩa

• license
• permit
• certify