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Definition of dual in English:

dual

Pronunciation /ˈd(y)o͞oəl/ /ˈd(j)uəl/

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adjective

  • 1attributive Consisting of two parts, elements, or aspects.

    ‘their dual role at work and home’
    • ‘Inexperienced nurses usually remain in orientation for an average of five months - longer if they are expected to function in a dual role.’
    • ‘From the beginning his relationship with her has got this dual element to it.’
    • ‘These critics also recognize the dual aspects of decolonization.’
    • ‘You combine dual aspects by being ambitious professionally and domesticated in the home and family situations.’
    • ‘His current role as executive chairman effectively combines the functions of chief executive and chairman, a dual role which is now frowned upon by institutions.’
    • ‘Rather, he wanted to imitate a different aspect of Moshe: his dual role.’
    • ‘The interesting aspect of this dual soundtrack is that each one presents a noticeably different version of the film.’
    • ‘Now, can I turn to their arguments and address what seem to us to be their dual aspect?’
    • ‘A word must be said about the office of coroner, which too had something of a dual aspect.’
    • ‘It was these dual aspects of perpetuity which were to assume such importance in America.’
    • ‘But Parkinson, a veteran of three title triumphs during the last two decades, has decided to step down altogether, leaving Lowe to perform a dual role this summer as Darwen prepare to defend their crown.’
    • ‘He wants to project that dual role.’
    • ‘Gavin Hamilton and Gary Fellows have dual roles to play.’
    • ‘Byrne said he was hugely impressed by the pupils' enthusiasm and by the various demonstrations and said he was being pragmatic and playing a dual role on the day in hoping to recruit new students for the college.’
    • ‘Pavee's attacking sweeper played a dual role as a tough defender and made sleek wing attacks that resulted in major inroads into Big Players' defense.’
    • ‘I like the notion of a library as a treasure chest, since it operates as a dual metaphor.’
    • ‘Funding dual language immersion programs and transportation programs that shuttle students between school districts can also promote school integration.’
    • ‘Most commonly, acute stabilization of patients with dual disorders refers to the management of physical, psychiatric, or drug toxicity crises.’
    • ‘Hopefully, the elimination of the dual mandate will take care of that.’
    • ‘Foster parents should be willing to commute, be bilingual and have dual nationality.’
    double, twofold, binary
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    1. 1.1Grammar (in some languages) denoting an inflection that refers to exactly two people or things (as distinct from singular and plural)
      ‘Old English has dual number for first- and second-person pronouns’
      • ‘Yimas proper distinguishes four numbers in its pronominal paradigm (singular, dual, paucal, and plural) while Yimas Pidgin has only three.’
      • ‘It has dual number, so nouns and verbs must be learned in singular, dual, and plural.’
      • ‘Languages with dual markers have a different plural affix for sets of two than the affix for sets greater than two.’
    2. 1.2(in an aircraft) using dual controls.
      ‘a dual flight’
      • ‘You might want to consider scheduling an annual dual flight with an experienced instructor to review downwind take-offs and landings.’
      • ‘Schedule periodic dual flights when the crosswind exceeds your comfort level.’
      • ‘It would show the reaction of non flyers being taken on dual flights in incredible scenery.’
      • ‘They arranged to give him a couple more hours of dual instruction.’
      • ‘Anyway, on this particular day I was scheduled for my fourth hour of dual instruction.’

  • 2often dual toMathematics
    (of a theorem, expression, etc.) related to another by the interchange of particular pairs of terms, such as “point” and “line.”.

    • ‘He had proved that compact abelian groups are dual to discrete abelian groups, and von Neumann was interested in extending this result.’

noun

  • 1Grammar
    A dual form of a word.

    1. 1.1The dual number.

  • 2Mathematics
    A theorem, expression, etc., that is dual to another.

    ‘In fact this theorem is simply the dual of Pascal's theorem which was proved in 1639.’
    • ‘Because of the demands of differentiability in distribution theory, the spaces of test-functions and their duals are somewhat more complicated.’

Origin

Late Middle English (as a noun denoting either of the two middle incisor teeth in each jaw): from Latin dualis, from duo ‘two’.