What's the difference between big and bigwig?

Big


Definition:

  • (superl.) Having largeness of size; of much bulk or magnitude; of great size; large.
  • (superl.) Great with young; pregnant; swelling; ready to give birth or produce; -- often figuratively.
  • (superl.) Having greatness, fullness, importance, inflation, distention, etc., whether in a good or a bad sense; as, a big heart; a big voice; big looks; to look big. As applied to looks, it indicates haughtiness or pride.
  • (n.) Alt. of Bigg
  • (v. t.) Alt. of Bigg

Example Sentences:

  • (1) That's why the big dreams have come from the smaller candidates such as the radical left's Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
  • (2) A dedicated goal makes a big difference in mobilising action and resources.
  • (3) We could do with similar action to cut out botnets and spam, but there aren't any big-money lobbyists coming to Mandelson pleading loss of business through those.
  • (4) Peter Stott of the Met Office, who led the study, said: "With global warming we're talking about very big changes in the overall water cycle.
  • (5) When faced with a big dilemma, the time-honoured tradition of politicians is to order an inquiry, and that is what Browne expects.
  • (6) How big tobacco lost its final fight for hearts, lungs and minds Read more Shares in Imperial closed down 1% and British American Tobacco lost 0.75%, both underperforming the FTSE100’s 0.3% decline.
  • (7) "With the advent of sophisticated data-processing capabilities (including big data), the big number-crunchers can detect, model and counter all manner of online activities just by detecting the behavioural patterns they see in the data and adjusting their tactics accordingly.
  • (8) Evidence of the industrial panic surfaced at Digital Britain when Sly Bailey, the chief executive of Trinity Mirror, suggested that national newspaper websites that chased big online audiences have "devalued news" , whatever that might mean.
  • (9) Living by the "Big River" as a child, Cash soaked up work songs, church music, and country & western from radio station WMPS in Memphis, or the broadcasts from Nashville's Grand Ole Opry on Friday and Saturday evenings.
  • (10) It could provoke the gravest risk, that all three rating agencies declare a credit event and then there are big contagion risks for other countries," he said.
  • (11) If Clegg's concerns do broadly accord with Cameron's, how will the PM sell such a big U-turn to his increasingly anti-Clegg backbenchers?
  • (12) Lady Gaga is not the first big music star to make a new album available early to mobile customers.
  • (13) Without that, and without undertaking big changes, the service's future may fall into doubt, he says.
  • (14) "They couldn't understand until I said 'No, because I'm a big shot now, because I am in Wild Wild West and I have, like, 10 covers coming out, and I want a bigger part.'
  • (15) For the past six years, a big focus of my work has been bringing the first schools to some of the remotest parts of northern Sierra Leone .
  • (16) The Treasury said: "Britain has been at the forefront of global reforms to make banking more responsible, including big reductions in upfront cash bonuses and linking rewards to long-term success.
  • (17) One of the big sticking points is cash – with rich countries so far failing to live up to promise to mobilise $100bn a year by 2020 for climate finance .
  • (18) Reverse-phase high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with radioimmunoassay revealed that the major component of ir-endothelin corresponds to standard endothelin-1 (1-21) and the major component of ir-big endothelin corresponds to standard big endothelin (porcine, 1-39).
  • (19) That clearly will have a big impact on the way people relate to each other and form bonds over the coming generations.
  • (20) It takes more than a statistical read out and the return of big bank bonuses for a real recovery," he said.

Bigwig


Definition:

  • (a.) A person of consequence; as, the bigwigs of society.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Yet the 12th edition of the winter spinoff of Art Basel, the prestigious Swiss art fair, is drawing the usual assortment of private jet passengers, museum bigwigs, advisers, consultants and social butterflies.
  • (2) Owing to the whole “ underage sex slave allegations ” thing currently besetting the Duke of York, an utterly bewildering number of bigwigs are coming out of the woodwork to speak up for Andy’s indispensability.
  • (3) "If you are a sibling of someone who is very important in China, automatically people will see you as a potential agent of influence and will treat you well in the hope of gaining guanxi [connections] with the bigwig relative," said Roderick MacFarquhar, an expert on Chinese elite politics at Harvard University.
  • (4) Under the gaze of protesters, Republican bigwigs such as Condoleezza Rice arrived to pay homage to – and write cheques for – a governor who has taken stances against gay marriage and the issue of raising taxes on the rich, while at the same time embarking on a union-bashing crusade against teachers in his home state.
  • (5) He has capitalised on his international upbringing and education to become chairman of Socialist International and build bonds with such global bigwigs as economics Nobel prizewinner Joseph Stiglitz and former US president Bill Clinton.
  • (6) But don't think it's just Republican bigwigs and oil execs rushing to lend the pipeline a hand.
  • (7) But the arrests of seven Fifa bigwigs in Zurich on Wednesday, and the coordination of a raid on Fifa’s $100m headquarters down the road with a raid on the Miami HQ of international football’s north and central American federation caught everyone off their guard.
  • (8) But,” he says without a trace of hyperbole, “I believe the journey up there will be the thing.” Inside the hangar we hear speeches from Virgin Galactic bigwigs, trumpeting what a fabulous achievement the new aircraft is.
  • (9) "On the doorstep," lamented one Labour bigwig, "people saw it as Boris v Ken."
  • (10) King, and four other Bank bigwigs, have been called to answer questions about the latest financial stability report – we expect plenty of questions on the eurozone crisis.
  • (11) New Labour bigwigs insisted that those voters “had nowhere else to go”.
  • (12) The other half, the party bigwigs roll up their sleeves and bruise in, weaklings following Ukip thugs.
  • (13) Against all the conventional wisdom of the then prevailing mindset of the studios’ marketing bigwigs, Universal Pictures – with a new monster on hand to match such signature Universal properties as Frankenstein and Dracula – decided on an unprecedentedly wide immediate opening in an era when the move was still largely a ploy to defang bad early word-of-mouth by vacuuming up all the available ticket-buyer money before the bad news got out (actually, this still holds good now).
  • (14) The bigwigs pressured the police to prosecute me," he says.
  • (15) One scene called for Davies, who has died of cancer aged 72, and his fellow child actors to look on enviously as the bigwigs of the workhouse devoured a great pile of pastries, hams and chicken.
  • (16) I am a casual tutor, you are permanent (an academic, subject coordinator, faculty bigwig).
  • (17) That combination has clearly endeared her to the SNL bigwigs: she was one of four musical performers on the show’s 40th anniversary special, alongside Paul McCartney, Kanye West and Paul Simon.
  • (18) Don't all the bigwig shrinks – your Freuds, Jungs and Laings – drone on about the importance of separation, individuation and self-actualisation?
  • (19) Given the ceremony’s choice of host, the outspoken Chris Rock, it’ll be a nervous night for Academy bigwigs.
  • (20) Better Together had Gordon Brown's impassioned rhetoric; it parachuted in Westminster bigwigs to make hurried vows for new Scottish powers.

Words possibly related to "big"

Words possibly related to "bigwig"