Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.

Definition: Beats |
BeatsNoun1. A United States youth subculture of the 1950s; rejected possessions or regular work or traditional dress; for communal living and psychedelic drugs and anarchism; favored modern forms of jazz (e.g., bebop). Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "beats" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1050. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Slang | Noun. Source: Probably from the word Beat, meaning to hit a drum repeatedly or to show or establish a musical rhythm. Definition: Instead of saying music, they use the word beat to talk about the music in which they are listening to or have listened to. Context: Used when talking to eachother on a casual basis about music. This could include being at a party or just hanging out with eachother any time. There is not one specific time this word will be used. You can say the word beats around parents, but they would. Social Source: Upper Middle Class Alaskan Students ages 17-20. Source: Compiled by The University of Oregon. (additional references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Synonyms: BeatsSynonyms: beat generation (n), beatniks (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Inexpectation | Phrase: little did one think, little did one expect; nobody would ever suppose, nobody would ever think, nobody would ever expect; who would have thought? it beats the Dutch. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | He beats you (The Women; writing credit: Anita Loos) A harpy, who beats him, and hits him, he he becomes her slave, and he sews her clothes, and worships-- (The English Patient; writing credit: Anthony Minghella) Inside every hardened criminal beats the heart of a ten-year-old boy. (The Simpsons; writing credit: Artur Brauner; Paul Hengge) But still, deep down, your heart beats like mine doesI know you feelI'm your son and I will always love you. (Dragon Ball Z; writing credit: Chris Forbis; Eric Johnson) No one beats Sub-Zero (Malcolm in the Middle; writing credit: Daniel Frenette) | |
Lyrics | And my heart beats again (Drowning; performing artist: Backstreet Boys) Ole Miss, John Glenn, Liston beats Patterson (We Didn't Start The Fire; performing artist: Billy Joel) She doesn't know your name and your heart beats like a subway train (Maria; performing artist: Blondie) The drum beats out of time (Time After Time; performing artist: Cyndi Lauper) Just chill, listen to the beats I spill (Keep Their Headz Ringin; performing artist: Dr. Dre) | |
Clever | Old folks say, "Only time the world beats a path to your door is if you're in the bathroom. (references; author: unknown) | |
Movie/TV Titles | Magoo Beats the Heat (1956) Tortoise Beats Hare (1941) Ko-Ko Beats Time (1929) Buster's Heart Beats (1926) Cupid Beats Father (1915) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
Books |
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Periodicals |
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Theater & Movies | |||
Music |
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High Tech |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
![]() | Time (the warder) to the visiting centuries: I've seen some pretty bad cases in my time, but this one beats them all. Credit: Library of Congress. | ![]() | It beats anything for a sinking spell. Credit: Library of Congress. |
![]() | Nurmi still setting worlds records : beats Shrubb's old mark for six mile run. Credit: Library of Congress. | ||
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| Play | Caption | Play | Caption |
| Methodical drum beats. | Three drum beats. | ||
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Author | Quotation |
Desiderius Erasmus | It is folly alone that stays the fugue of Youth and beats off louring Old Age. |
Oscar Wilde | A man's very highest moment is, I have no doubt at all, when he kneels in the dust, and beats his breast, and tells all the sins of his life. |
Stella Adler | Life beats down and crushes the soul and art reminds you that you have one. |
Walter Bagehot | Conquest is the missionary of valor, and the hard impact of military virtues beats meanness out of the world. |
William Blake | A truth that's told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | Immediately when the drum beats the charge, let the twenty from below rush to the barricade |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | It affects how steadily your heart beats. (references) | |
When this occurs the normal rhythm of the heart may be disturbed by abnormal beats. (references) | ||
Describing how the heart beats normally helps to explain what happens during an arrhythmia. (references) | ||
Human Rights | Jamaica | For example, designated policemen walk beats and interact with members of the community on a daily basis. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Beats" is generally used as a lexical verb (-s form) -- approximately 51.81% of the time. "Beats" is used about 415 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Lexical Verb (-s form) | 51.81% | 215 | 20,643 |
| Noun (plural) | 48.19% | 200 | 21,580 |
| Total | 100.00% | 415 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "beats": beats per minute ♦ it beats the devil! ♦ it beats the dutch ♦ that beats all devil! ♦ that beats all! ♦ that beats cockfighting ♦ that beats everything! ♦ that beats everyting ♦ that beats me ♦ that beats me! ♦ that beats the devil! ♦ who would have thought? it beats the Dutch. Additional references. | |
| Hypenated Usage | |
Ending with "beats": heart-beats, hoof-beats, wing-beats. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
beats.com greet | 5 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "beats"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Arabic | إنه يهزمني (that beats me). (various references) | |
Chinese | 敲" (BEAT). (various references) | |
Czech | to je tedy vrchol (that beats everything, that puts the lid on it, that takes the cake). (various references) | |
French | battement (beat, beating), bat, harmoniques d'addition, abat. (various references) | |
German | Schwebung (beat, beating), schlägt (bashes, batters, dollies, flicks, hits, knocks, pommels, pummels, raps, slats, slugs, strikes, whacks). (various references) | |
Hebrew | לא יכול ל"יות (it beats the dutch), אפשר ל"שת'ע מן- (it beats the dutch). (various references) | |
Hungarian | hihetetlen! (that beats the dutch!), ez nekem magas (it is beyond my comprehension, it's above me, that licks me, this beats me), ez mindennek a teteje! (that beats everything!, that puts the lid on it!), ez mindenen túltesz! (that beats everything!), ez lehetetlen! (that beats the dutch!), ez kifog rajtam (this beats me), ez ki van zárva! (that beats the dutch!). (various references) | |
Italian | bpm (beats per minute), battiti per minuto (beats per minute). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 拍数 (count of beats in music), 拍'数える (to count beats). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | はくすう (count of beats in music), はく'かぞえる (to count beats). (various references) | |
Korean | 구타 (BEAT). (various references) | |
Manx | cor-woallaghyn. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | eatsbay.(various references) | |
Romanian | mare comedie (a pretty kettle of fish, that beats all devil, well I never), e prea din cale afarã (it beats the devil), asta-i culmea (it is the limit, that beats all devil), asta-i colac peste pupãzã (that beats all), asta mã depãşeşte (it is beyond me, that beats me), asta e prea boacãnã (that beats the devil, that crowns it all), asta e bunã (here's a fine how-d'ye-do, that beats all). (various references) | |
Russian | бить удар (kick). (various references) | |
Swedish | slår. (various references) | |
Turkish | bu kadar da olmaz (that beats everyting, that takes the biscuit, that's a bit stiff), berbat birşey (that beats cockfighting), beni aşar (that beats me), horoz dövüşünden de beter (that beats cockfighting), en iyisi bu (that beats everyting), canıma yetti (that beats everyting). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | malleator, malleatoris. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words ending with "beats": backbeats, browbeats, deadbeats, downbeats, drumbeats, heartbeats, hoofbeats, offbeats, overbeats, upbeats. (additional references) | |
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"Beats" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: baelts, baet, bayat, bealt, bealts, beata, beate, Beath, Beatt, beaty, beauts, beest, befast, begats, bejants, Benatsky, besta, bhats, biast, breats, bte, byast, ebast. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "beats" (pronounced bē"ts) |
| 4 | b ē" t s | beets. |
| 3 | -ē" t s | cheats, cleats, competes, completes, deceits, deets, defeats, depletes, eats, elites, feats, fleets, greets, heats, meats, meets, mistreats, petites, pleats, receipts, repeats, retreats, seats, sheets, skeets, streets, suites, sweets, teats, treats. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
Direct Anagrams: abets, baste, bates, beast, betas, tabes. | |
| Words within the letters "a-b-e-s-t" | |
-1 letter: abet, ates, base, bast, bate, bats, beat, best, beta, bets, east, eats, etas, sabe, sate, seat, seta, stab, tabs, teas. | |
-2 letters: abs, ate, bas, bat, bet, eat, eta, sab, sae, sat, sea, set, tab, tae, tas, tea. | |
-3 letters: ab, ae, as, at, ba, be, es, et, ta. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-b-e-s-t" | |
+1 letter: abates, ablest, absent, barest, basest, basket, basset, basted, baster, bastes, bathes, beasts, beauts, bettas, bleats, breast, stable, tabers, tables. | |
+2 letters: abaters, ablates, abreast, absents, albites, arbutes, astilbe, backset, baddest, baguets, baiters, baldest, ballets, bannets, banters, banties, baptise, barbets, barites, barrets, barters, barytes, basinet, baskets, bassets, basters, bastile, batches, bathers, batiste, batsmen, battens, batters, battles, battues, bawties, beastie, beastly, beaters, bedfast, berates, berthas, bestead, bestial, betakes, betrays, bezants, bistate, blasted, blaster, blastie, boasted, boaster, boatels, boaters, borates, bravest, brawest, breasts, breaths, bursate, butanes, cablets, dabster, debates, gabfest, labrets, oblates, rabbets, rebaits, rebates, rebatos, seaboot, setback, sorbate, stabbed, stabber, stabile, stabled, stabler, stables, sublate, tabbies, tablets, terbias, upbeats. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Images: Photo Album 8. Sounds | 9. Quotations: Familiar 10. Quotations: Fiction 11. Quotations: Non-fiction 12. Usage Frequency | 13. Expressions 14. Expressions: Internet 15. Translations: Modern 16. Translations: Ancient | 17. Derivations 18. Rhymes 19. Anagrams 20. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.