(v. t.) To lay a claim to; to allege a title to; to claim.
(v. t.) To hold before, or put forward, as a cloak or disguise for something else; to exhibit as a veil for something hidden.
(v. t.) To hold out, or represent, falsely; to put forward, or offer, as true or real (something untrue or unreal); to show hypocritically, or for the purpose of deceiving; to simulate; to feign; as, to pretend friendship.
(v. t.) To intend; to design; to plot; to attempt.
(v. t.) To hold before one; to extend.
(v. i.) To put in, or make, a claim, truly or falsely; to allege a title; to lay claim to, or strive after, something; -- usually with to.
(v. i.) To hold out the appearance of being, possessing, or performing; to profess; to make believe; to feign; to sham; as, to pretend to be asleep.
Example Sentences:
(1) His anti-politics act may just be a shtick – pretending he's still on Have I Got News for You, satirising politics even though he's right at the centre of it – but it liberates him from the usual constraints.
(2) "Obviously [writers in translation] have a disadvantage and there's no sense pretending they don't, of being read in translation," said Gekoski.
(3) Tony Abbott pretended to support the renewable energy industry before the election but is now “launching a full-frontal attack” according to Labor’s environment spokesman Mark Butler.
(4) The Telegraph's secret taping of Cable and fellow Liberal Democrat ministers while pretending to be concerned constituents has raised eyebrows in some media quarters, but the newspaper has claimed a "clear public interest" defence for its actions.
(5) It is hard to tell who has really suffered, and who is only pretending.
(6) Respecting the frequency of invalidity this cancer pretends the second place among these diseases.
(7) When this parliament votes for another referendum as it inevitably will, thanks to the perpetual crutch that the Greens provide, let’s not pretend it reflects the will of the Scottish people, because it doesn’t.
(8) Non-doms could no longer pretend to live in Monaco while living in the UK for four working days a week.
(9) But equally, you’re ignoring how these people feel if you try and pretend they don’t feel their area is changing.
(10) Additionally, the Schmidt-Furlow investigators looked at instances where female interrogators had fondled prisoners, or pretended to splash menstrual blood upon them.
(11) Stewart Lee with a mask made of meat, pretending to be Canadian?
(12) Yes, there are other reasons why a boy might take a clock out of its casing & pretend he’d made it.
(13) It would be idle to pretend that Cameron doesn't have talents as a leader.
(14) Their leaders are charging round the country pretending they are going to get an overall majority, but in their heart of hearts they know it is not true, you can see it in their eyes.” The deputy prime minister, whose party has been in coalition with the Conservatives since 2010, said the next question for the public was “that since neither David Cameron or Ed Miliband are going to walk into Downing Street on their own, who is it the voters want at their side”.
(15) By pretending to ignore the scientific evidence, AquaBounty is doing readers a disservice.
(16) Pro-Europeans don't do themselves any favours by trying to pretend that it didn't happen.
(17) Indeed watching the prime minister singling out unemployed youngsters for uniquely punitive measures while pretending it is for their own good, cheered on by a gang of braying chums, it looks less like the behaviour of a national statesman and more like the petty vindictiveness of a schoolyard bully.
(18) And he must not pretend to be ignorant of the consequences of continuing to burn coal or take refuge in a "carbon cap" or some "target" for future emission reductions.
(19) During the collection of a one-hour spontaneous language sample from each child the experimenter pretended 20 times not to understand and asked, "What?"
(20) He would go around the communities and pretend to have a conversation with people but really his eyes were on the children playing," she says.
Woo
Definition:
(v. t.) To solicit in love; to court.
(v. t.) To court solicitously; to invite with importunity.
(v. i.) To court; to make love.
Example Sentences:
(1) The striking weakness of Clegg's thesis was what it left out in its attempt to carve out a position for restless party activists as their poll ratings dip (down to 14% according to ICM) as Miliband tones down his own anti-Lib Dem rhetoric to woo them.
(2) Apart from a few diehards, it will be hard to mourn the defeat in 2010 of a political party that lost its moral bearings in its bid to woo middle England, slavishly reflecting back what it believed this narrow constituency wanted to hear.
(3) The idea of cutting corporation tax was floated in the Sunday Express last month as a way of wooing banks considering leaving the UK because of an impending Brexit.
(4) Unless those at the bottom of the heap can represent themselves, and the inarticulate will not know how to woo judges, they will be outlaws.
(5) Konstantin Malofeev, a wealthy Russian oligarch, Putin-backer and extreme nationalist who has said Ukraine is an artificial creation, appears to be a central figure in the funding and wooing of Russian support in Europe.
(6) The recorded comments emerged on the eve of a general election in which the Tory party is attempting to woo Liberal voters and gain seats in the south currently held by the Liberal Democrats by proving it will be tougher on discrimination and embrace equality.
(7) Greene King wooed Spirit in an attempt to expand in London and south-east England, where people have more money to spend on drinking and eating out.
(8) A group of ex-miners appear to have been wooed by Osborne when he visited them ahead of a trip to the Thoresby colliery in Nottinghamshire earlier this month to announce the government would underwrite a fuel-benefit scheme.
(9) Nevertheless Spielberg “is currently trying to woo me to go over there to do films with DreamWorks”.
(10) The dinner was part of efforts to woo the then influential Fifa vice-president Jack Warner, who has since quit football in disgrace.
(11) This does not stop further attempts to merge with other Arab nations – Sudan and Egypt decline his wooing as well.
(12) But at least they won it, Kim Jung-woo causing mild havoc in the area with a free kick in from the right, Lugano forced to head behind.
(13) Bearing in mind that the beaus will be queuing round the block to woo Gigi, perhaps she should bite the bullet and think of the dosh.
(14) Using the “golden era” phrase coined by David Cameron and George Osborne in their attempts to woo the Chinese , May said on Thursday: “I am determined that as we leave the European Union, we build a truly global Britain that is open for business.
(15) The court ruled that Woolas's claim, in mocked-up newspapers, that Watkins had "wooed" Islamic extremists and failed to condemn radical groups attacks, was deliberately and knowingly misleading.
(16) Outcry The Business Birmingham team has been wooing politicians and business people at home and has sent international trade delegations to India, France and five cities across the US.
(17) Elwyn Watkins claimed that Woolas knowingly misled voters in Oldham East in a desperate bid to stir up religious tensions in the last days of the election by claiming Watkins had "wooed" Islamic extremists.
(18) Rommey's attempt to woo Hispanic voters was further damaged on Thursday with the emergence of a clip from a video of a Romney fundraiser in which he said that illegal immigrants generally "have no skill or experience".
(19) For Vona is here to woo the estimated 50,000 Hungarian expats living in the UK, more than half of whom live in London and the south-east of England.
(20) On the diplomatic front, Abe is busily wooing his Asian neighbours.