Other forms: shows, showed, showing
To show something is to put it where someone can see it. You show your ticket at the barrier, show a friend a photo on your phone, show the doctor where it hurts.
Show takes two objects with no preposition between them: show me the map, show her the way. It also means to prove — the figures show that costs have risen — and to guide: show him to his seat, show them around the office. Turn it around and it means to be visible: the stain still shows, his nerves did not show. As a noun, a show is a performance or a programme, from a Saturday night show on television to a flower show in a village hall. Two phrasal verbs earn their keep: show up means to arrive, and show off means to display something for admiration.
1verbshowTo let someone see something.~2%
“Show me what you have in your hand.”
2verbvisibleTo be visible or noticeable.~2%
“The mark on the wall still shows through the new paint.”
3verbdemonstrateTo prove something or make it clear.~2%
“The results show a steady drop in errors.”
synonyms: demonstrate, prove, indicate
4verbguideTo guide someone to a place.~2%
“A waiter showed us to a table by the window.”
5nounperformanceA performance or a programme on stage, television or radio.~90%
“The show starts at eight and runs for two hours.”
6nounpublicA public event where things are put out to be looked at or judged.~2%
“She won a rosette at the village flower show.”
Shares are an estimate: a language model read 16 sentences found in the wild and placed 16 of them on a sense — a count of our sample, not a measurement of English.
Old English sceawian, the ancestor of show, meant to look at rather than to let someone look — to inspect, to examine. Over the centuries the word crossed from the eye of the watcher to the hand of the person holding something up. Follow the root back to Proto-Indo-European (s)kewh1-, to heed or take note of, and you land beside Latin caveo, which gave English caution and caveat: showing and being careful grew from the same idea of paying attention.
Proto-Indo-European
*(s)kewh₁-
Middle English
schewen
English, today
show
From Middle English schewen. From Middle English schewen, from Old English scēawian (“to look, look at, exhibit, display”), from Proto-West Germanic skauwōn, from Proto-Germanic skawwōną (“to look, see”), from Proto-Indo-European (s)kewh₁- (“to heed, look, feel, take note of”); see haw, gaum, caveat, caution. Cognate with Scots shaw (“to show”), Dutch schouwen (“to inspect, view”), German schauen (“to see, behold”), Danish skue (“to behold”). Related to sheen.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA