1.1A less important or conspicuous position or function.
‘after that evening, she remained in the background’
‘There is a whole system at work here, chugging along quietly in the background, unnoticed, and when you stop to think about it, its just awesome!’
‘Ideally, you should be quiet, in the background, unnoticed forever.’
‘Surely, there had to be a highly developed public relations conspiracy orchestrated in the background.’
‘When I arrived a few young women were tucking into some very well presented fare, as music played unobtrusively in the background.’
‘When he was finish, the three friends sat in contemplative silence, the movie still playing unnoticed in the background.’
‘There were other voices in the background: inconsequential static.’
‘But Mitchell preferred to remain in the background, always giving credit to others.’
‘There were always a couple of them, with a scribe lurking unobtrusively in the background and taking notes in an indecipherable shorthand.’
‘They work in the background and their contribution invariably goes unnoticed.’
‘With the theme tune in the background of your mind, it is just too much to handle!’
‘However, they fail to provide any supplementary advice for the situation where the cook twiddles with a roast while the owner of the kitchen hangs around crossly in the background.’
‘I think I heard something like a squeaky playground merry-go-round in the background, or maybe it was a squeaky gate door.’
‘One or two big projects that I've had rumbling on in the background, not really my core job but those nice added extras that we'd all like to be able to play with, have finally come to fruition.’
‘I listen to classical music played softly in the background.’
‘Over here there's a poker game, then there's this drunk that keeps coming into the room, and in the background there's a couple checking into the hotel.’
‘In the meantime you're hearing the music in the background.’
‘Now, I can see myself in that niche: I've always liked being the lieutenant who keeps things running smoothly in the background.’
‘‘It's not something that comes to the forefront, it's always in the background,’ he says.’
‘‘My style is that I would much rather work the phones in the background than make a lot of statements,’ he said.’
‘The piano pieces during the film's second half sound a little thin even though they serve more as background than anything else.’
behind the scenes, out of the public eye, out of the spotlight, out of the limelight, backstage
2.1A person's education, experience, and social circumstances.
‘she has a background in nursing’
‘her voice suggested a tenacious, working-class background’
‘We're providing very little incentive for students from social and economically disadvantaged backgrounds to come into education.’
‘We all have different sensitivities, social backgrounds, families and different experiences of discipline and violence in real life.’
‘One of the main aims of this project is not just to widen the cohort of volunteers, but also to make sure that young people of different social backgrounds can come together in a common experience.’
‘His motivation was that there should be no barriers to people with different education background and solid banking experience.’
‘Common educational and social backgrounds have brought American and many foreign leaders closer.’
‘Will they have extensive educational backgrounds and technical experience?’
‘Yet he struggled with contempt for his social background and deficient education.’
‘It's a small but diverse business community but with a wealth of different backgrounds, strengths, experience and viewpoints.’
‘Two people from two different backgrounds will likely experience a significant number of challenges and communication barriers.’
‘Furthermore, they come from three very different backgrounds and social settings, which lends depth and perspective to their accounts.’
‘Yet the bitter 26-year feud that has divided them has its roots more in each man's very different personal and social backgrounds.’
‘She will blame the couple's very different social backgrounds for the differences that eventually led to the collapse of their marriage.’
‘They come from different backgrounds, both social and cultural, and are united only by their religious mission.’
‘You can use your legal background and your position in the community to help inspire a moral rebirth in a society that condones bad things.’
‘With her arts management background, she also serves as a mentor and adviser for the staff in their artistic careers.’
‘All faculty members regardless of cultural background can serve as a role model.’
‘Her art background had given her an appreciation of Japanese woodblock prints.’
‘This allows the work to bridge cultural difference, engaging - not distancing - viewers of varying backgrounds.’
‘Coming from a rural background, the city scenes ignited his imagination.’
‘I am a personal chef/trainer in New York City with a background in sport nutrition and healthy cooking.’
‘And in the big sparse invisible drops that fall early, with no wind, the new rice dances jade and silver, backgrounded by a slanting late summer afternoon rain by Hokusai.’
‘The back cover, with what looks at first sight like a grainy shot of her as a poet-movie star is backgrounded by text.’
‘Here the split images, paralleling, fore- and backgrounding of the original dancers with the current ensemble, acted more as a commentary on the passage of time.’
2Provide with background.
‘the embassy backgrounded American reporters’
‘I still cringe at the memory of a gag I made on a policy while backgrounding a journalist before an interview that was turned into a very barbed question for my boss.’
‘It's no surprise that one is the first wife; she was out in the media in December and she's been backgrounding journalists ever since.’
‘The magazine has a good article backgrounding a politician's use of internet networking.’
‘A while back, Media Watch backgrounded the reason for the inquiry in light of the submissions to the Films, Videos, and Publications Classification Amendment Bill.’
‘The first thing I would say is that it appears that a number of journalists have been backgrounded.’
‘He introduces the letters with somewhat formal, at times clumsy, historical notes backgrounding the existing social and political conditions both in England and in New Zealand.’
‘I promise, I'll get to the story eventually; there just needs to be backgrounding here for those who aren't in the know and/or haven't worked at an animal hospital or been to a farm.’
‘In fact, in this case he was backgrounding journalists in the full knowledge of his departmental minders and masters.’
‘This long campaign of leaking, backgrounding and sabotage would be legitimised.’
‘It would have been better with more scene-setting, backgrounding and introduction of the personalities.’
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