Other forms: sorts, sorted, sorting
To sort things is to separate them into groups. Socks into pairs, post into a pile for you and a pile for the bin, recycling into paper, glass and plastic.
Sorting covers grouping by kind and putting into order — a computer sorts a list by date, and that counts too. The noun is everywhere in speech: what sort of dog is that, some sort of problem, that sort of thing. British English softens whole sentences with sort of — it is sort of blue, I sort of agree — and sort out means fix or deal with, so I will sort it out is a promise to handle it. Sorted, on its own, means done. Out of sorts is the odd one in the family: it means slightly unwell or in a low mood, and has nothing to do with sorting anything.
1verbsortTo separate things into groups.~14%
“She sorted the letters into two piles on the kitchen table.”
2verbarrangeTo arrange things in a particular order.~49%
“You can sort the list by date or by surname.”
3verbdeal(sort out) To deal with a problem or put something in order.~2%
“Give me an hour and I will sort out the seating.”
4nounnounA kind or type.~35%
“What sort of music does he play at these things?”
Shares are an estimate: a language model read 15 sentences found in the wild and placed 14 of them on a sense (1 were unclear) — a count of our sample, not a measurement of English.
sort is a way of organising things.
Sort came from Old French sorte, a class or kind, from Latin sors, meaning lot, fate, share, rank, category — the lot you draw. Your sort was first the lot that fell to you, then the class you belonged to, and only later the act of putting things into classes at all.
Proto-Indo-European
*ser- (bind)
Latin
sortem
Old French
sorte — class, kind
Middle English
sort
English, today
sort
Built from
From Middle English sort, soort, sorte (cognate Dutch soort, German Sorte, Danish sort, Swedish sort), borrowed from Old French sorte (“class, kind”), from Latin sortem, accusative form of sors (“lot, fate, share, rank, category”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA