Other forms: impersonations
Impersonation is the pretending to be somebody else. A good impersonation, criminal impersonation.
On stage it is a compliment and in law it is an offence, and the difference is the intention. A good impersonation catches the rhythm rather than the voice, which is what nobody expects.
1nounimpersonationThe pretending to be somebody else.
“The impersonation was good enough to fool the switchboard twice.”
impersonation is a pretending.
Impersonate plus -ion, from Latin in plus persona, a mask or character.
Middle English
persoun
English
person
English, today
impersonation
From im + person + ation or impersonate + ion. person comes from Middle English persoun. From Middle English persoun, personne et al., from Anglo-Norman parsone, persoun et al. (Old French persone (“human being”), French personne), and its source Latin persōna (“mask used by actor; role, part, character”), perhaps a loanword from ett 𐌘𐌄𐌓𐌔𐌖 (“mask”). In this sense, displaced native man, which came to mean primarily "adult male" in Middle English; see mann. Displaced native Old English hād (“person, individual”). a doublet of parson and persona.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA