Section \Sec"tion\, n. [L. sectio, fr. secare, sectum, to cut; akin to E. saw a cutting instrument: cf. F. section. See {Saw}, and cf. {Scion}, {Dissect}, {Insect}, {Secant}, {Segment}.] 1. The act of cutting, or separation by cutting; as, the section of bodies.
2. A part separated from something; a division; a portion; a slice. Specifically: (a) A distinct part or portion of a book or writing; a subdivision of a chapter; the division of a law or other writing; a paragraph; an article; hence, the character [sect], often used to denote such a division.
It is hardly possible to give a distinct view of his several arguments in distinct sections. --Locke. (b) A distinct part of a country or people, community, class, or the like; a part of a territory separated by geographical lines, or of a people considered as distinct.
The extreme section of one class consists of bigoted dotards, the extreme section of the other consists of shallow and reckless empirics. --Macaulay. (c) One of the portions, of one square mile each, into which the public lands of the United States are divided; one thirty-sixth part of a township. These sections are subdivided into quarter sections for sale under the homestead and pre["e]mption laws.
3. (Geom.) The figure made up of all the points common to a superficies and a solid which meet, or to two superficies which meet, or to two lines which meet. In the first case the section is a superficies, in the second a line, and in the third a point.
4. (Nat. Hist.) A division of a genus; a group of species separated by some distinction from others of the same genus; -- often indicated by the sign [sect].
5. (Mus.) A part of a musical period, composed of one or more phrases. See {Phrase}.
6. The description or representation of anything as it would appear if cut through by any intersecting plane; depiction of what is beyond a plane passing through, or supposed to pass through, an object, as a building, a machine, a succession of strata; profile.
Note: In mechanical drawing, as in these Illustrations of a cannon, a longitudinal section (a) usually represents the object as cut through its center lengthwise and vertically; a cross or transverse section (b), as cut crosswise and vertically; and a horizontal section (c), as cut through its center horizontally. Oblique sections are made at various angles. In architecture, a vertical section is a drawing showing the interior, the thickness of the walls, etc., as if made on a vertical plane passed through a building.
{Angular sections} (Math.), a branch of analysis which treats of the relations of sines, tangents, etc., of arcs to the sines, tangents, etc., of their multiples or of their parts. [R.]
{Conic sections}. (Geom.) See under {Conic}.
{Section liner} (Drawing), an instrument to aid in drawing a series of equidistant parallel lines, -- used in representing sections.
{Thin section}, a section or slice, as of mineral, animal, or vegetable substance, thin enough to be transparent, and used for study under the microscope.
Syn: Part; portion; division.
Usage: {Section}, {Part}. The English more commonly apply the word section to a part or portion of a body of men; as, a section of the clergy, a small section of the Whigs, etc. In the United States this use is less common, but another use, unknown or but little known in England, is very frequent, as in the phrases ``the eastern section of our country,'' etc., the same sense being also given to the adjective sectional; as, sectional feelings, interests, etc.
But the most controversial section of the legislation was the plan to overhaul the law that blocks new products with any element of futurity from trading on a securities exchange.
David Sendler, TV Guide's national section editor, acknowledged the illustration could be mistaken for a photograph.
Wan's brother and father still work in the financial section of the company, he said.
If the waiver is denied, any member on the floor can raise a point of order to delete the offending section.
In another room, Marlowe takes a circular section cut from the middle of a condom, similar to a wide rubber band, and stretches it on a machine to test its tensile strength _ how far it will stretch before it snaps.
Winderlich told a news conference that protesters also had broken into the building's section for counter-espionage activities but did not discover the identity of the section's workers.
Winderlich told a news conference that protesters also had broken into the building's section for counter-espionage activities but did not discover the identity of the section's workers.
A mother raccoon and her two babies who fell through a library ceiling were back in their attic nest Wednesday after spending a day browsing through the reference section.
The group would be modeled after one established in 1985 to promote bank-fraud prosecutions, said William Hendricks III, head of the department's fraud section.
Trading was thin, with first section volume estimated at 350 million shares, down from Tuesday's 400 million.
Workers were not required to use the regulator, since mining in the section had been completed on Sept. 6, and the four workers who died in the area of high methane concentration were dismantling a longwall mining machine, Smith said.
A jet with 78 people aboard made an emergency landing Sunday after a section of its landing gear malfunctioned, and one wing caught fire briefly as it scraped the runway, officials said.
The man was told to take the money to a street corner in Boston's Mattapan section.
Eyewitness accounts differed, but authorities believed at least two vehicles were on the bridge section when it gave out.
Five interpreters spent two days translating the section, which was then sent to Taiwan via facsimile transmission for typesetting using a computer that allows high quality generation of Chinese characters, the paper said.
This involves roundabout and bridge construction plus dualling of a section of this route, which will require over 70,000 tonnes of coated materials.
The report's section on productivity used 1977 as a base year for comparison.
Volume on the first section Thursday was estimated at 330 million shares, up from 223.5 million shares Wednesday. Gaining issues outnumbered declining issues 599 to 345, while 153 issues remained unchanged.
In the bars and stable yards at Badminton, this will be the main topic of conversation among the competitors. The final stage of any three-day event is the showjumping section.
Up to 1,000 barges are sidelined in the St. Louis harbor, a 20-mile section of the river, below a huge ice bridge that has formed just north of the city at the confluence of the Missouri River, according to the Coast Guard.
Using a series of 40 hidden cameras, researchers have found a larger population of grizzly bears than previously believed inhabiting a section of national forest in northwestern Montana.
Mr. Downie argues that the Post wrote about the prostitution ring in May and that a story, in answer to the Times' disclosures starting June 29, appeared in the Post's metro section July 1.
Trading was thin with 430 million shares changing hands on the first section, down from Wednesday's 500 million.
As an offset, the Bush team scrambles to include a forceful section for child care.
They said the problems could occur in any cramped conditions, even if flying business- or first-class, but were more likely in the economy section.
Making sure that the signal is secure is part of BSkyB's contractual obligations under agreements with the studios. The UK government has dealt with the issue by inserting a section in the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
'We are trying to position UK chartered surveyors as leaders,' says Ms Marianne Tisser, head of the European section of RICS.
But some of the problems may also occur with section 32 policies, executive pension plans and money purchase schemes. What can be done to solve these problems, given that the transfer charges on a pension are so high?
The Beaver fire, named for a village on the Yukon River, remained Alaska's largest; on Sunday it was burning a 10-by-48-mile section of spruce forest, said Hogervorst-Rukke.
A flight attendant was killed and 61 persons injured when a portion of the fuselage on a Boeing 737 peeled off during an Aloha flight from Hilo to Honolulu, exposing the first-class section to the open air at 24,000 feet.