chair

chair

NOUN

• 1A separate seat for one person, typically with a back and four legs.

  1. 1.1
     short for electric chair
• 2The person in charge of a meeting or of an organization (used as a neutral alternative to chairman or chairwoman) 2014.10.30 英文很有彈性。以前女權興起，說(女)董事長要稱chairperson。

  今天看杜邦公司發的新聞稿，只用chair： 
  Columbia Business School Awards Deming Cup to DuPont Chair & CEO Ellen Kullman

  ‘she's the chair of a research committee’

  1. 2.1The post of a chairperson.
     ‘he was due to step down after a three-year stint in the chair’
• 3A professorship.

  ‘he held a chair in physics’
• 4British A metal socket holding a rail in place on a railway sleeper.

VERB

[WITH OBJECT]

• 1Act as chairperson of or preside over (an organization, meeting, or public event)

  ‘the debate was chaired by the Archbishop of York’
• 2British Carry (someone) aloft in a chair or in a sitting position to celebrate a victory.

  ‘no one seemed anxious to chair him round the hall’

Phrases

• take the chair
• Act as chairperson.
  ‘the account executive will usually take the chair in meetings’

Origin

Middle English: from Old French chaiere (modern chaire bishop's throne, etc., chaise chair), from Latin cathedra seat, from Greek kathedra. Compare with cathedral.