back and forth
Definition
C2 moving first in one direction and then in the opposite one: She swayed gently back and forth to the music.Backwards, sideways and back and forth
(Definition of back and forth from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus
© Cambridge University Press)
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You are looking at an entry to do with Backwards, sideways and back and forth, but you might be interested in these topics from the Movement and location topic area:
- Advancing and moving forward
- Arrivals and departures
- Arriving, entering and invading
- Bending, twisting and curving
- Boarding and alighting from modes of transport
- Bouncing
- Changing direction
- Crossing and moving through
- Delivering and despatching
- Departing
- Describing movement towards
- Digging
- Direction of motion
- Down and downward
- Emitting and ejecting
- Evicting and forcing to leave
- Falling and dropping
- Fast and rapid
- General words for movement
- Immobility
- Increasing and decreasing speed of motion
- Inserting and forcing things into other things
- Jumping
- Making short, sudden movements
- Messengers and people who deliver things
- Movement
- Movement of liquids
- Movement on or through water
- Movement through the air
- Moving a long way on foot
- Moving downwards
- Moving firmly on foot
- Moving gently on foot
- Moving in order to avoid contact
- Moving on your hands and legs or on your stomach
- Moving quickly
- Moving to avoid being seen
- Moving unsteadily or with difficulty
- Moving upwards
- Not holding the body upright
- Phrases telling people to go away
- Physical gestures of respect
- Places and locations
- Placing and positioning an object
- Pleasant and make-believe places
- Posture
- Pulling
- Pursuing
- Pushing and shoving
- Raising and lowering
- Reclining
- Removing and extracting
- Returning to a place
- Revolving, rotating and spinning
- Runaways and refugees
- Running away and escaping
- Shaking, swinging and vibrating
- Sitting and standing
- Slow and moving slowly
- Speed of motion
- Staying and remaining
- Stretching the body
- Taking someone somewhere or telling them the way
- Throwing
- Transferring and transporting objects
- Turning upside down
- Unpleasant places
- Up and upward
- Visiting
- Walking and walkers
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SMART Thesaurus
Synonyms and related words:
- anticlockwise adjective, adverb
- aside adverb (TO ONE SIDE)
- back adverb (FURTHER AWAY)
- back noun (FURTHEST PART)
- backward adjective (OPPOSITE DIRECTION)
- backwards adverb
- counterclockwise adjective, adverb
- crabwise adverb
- from preposition (REMOVE)
- retro- prefix (BACKWARDS)
- right/wrong way round idiom
- saw verb 2
- sideways adverb, adjective
- stand back phrasal verb
- step aside phrasal verb
- to and fro adverb, adjective
- to-ing and fro-ing noun
- up preposition (ALONG)
- up preposition (ORIGIN)
- wrong adjective (NOT SUITABLE)
Word of the Day
gesticulate
to make movements with your hands or arms, to express something or to emphasize what you are saying
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