how

A greeting, used in representations of Native American speech.

Adverb

  1. To what degree or extent.
    • How often do you practice?
    • The gauge indicated how hot the oven was.
    • How soon can I see the doctor?
  2. In what manner:
    • Economics is a messy discipline: too fluid to be a science, too rigorous to be an art. Perhaps it is fitting that economists’ most-used metric, gross domestic product (GDP), is a tangle too.[…]But as a foundation for...

    1. By what means.

      • How do you solve this puzzle? –Sorry, I can't remember how.
      • How else can we get this finished?
      • She showed him how to do it.

      Synonyms: wherewithal wherein

    2. With overtones of why, for what reason.

      • How should I know whether he likes raisins or not? Ask him!

    3. In what form, shape, measure, quantity, etc.

      • How are you fixed for money?
      • How did you vote in the last election?
      • How do you like it here?

    4. With what meaning or effect.

      • How the stock market interprets events has real consequences.
      • A heap of stamps? Yes. Stamps they were indeed, hundreds of penny Queen's Heads neatly mounted on the original sheets. "Good God!" exclaimed Mr. Erskine as he turned to Mr. Sackville, "how am I to take this, sir?" said...

    5. By what title or what name.

      • "How art thou called? Thy name make known; Thy father's name and family,—tell me thy father's and thine own." - 1907, Edward Byles Cowell, The Jātaka: Or, Stories of the Buddha's Former Births, page 44:
      • Salutation—How does one address the recipient; what titles, greetings, and honorifics are preferred; how does one manage the problem of unknown gender;[…] - 2015, Edmond H. Weiss, The Elements of International English...

    6. At what price, for what amount (of money).

      • Shal. How a score of ewes now? Sil. Thereafter as they be: a score of good ewes may be worth ten pounds. - c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]. Epilogue.”, in Mr....
  3. In what state or condition.
    • How are you?
    • How was your vacation?
    • How's the new apartment? — The new apartment is great! - 2016, VOA Learning English (public domain)
  4. In the manner in which.
    • I said it exactly how he said it.
  5. In any manner in which; in whatever way; however.
    • People should be free to live how they want.
  6. In which.
    • The way how you walk is funny.
  7. Used as a modifier to indicate surprise, delight, or other strong feelings in an exclamation.
    • How very interesting!
    • How wonderful it was to receive your invitation.
    • Those were such happy times and not so long ago / How I wondered where they'd gone - 1973, “Yesterday Once More”, in Now & Then, performed by the Carpenters:

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *kʷ- Proto-Indo-European *kʷís Proto-Germanic *hwō Old English hū Middle English how English how From Middle English how, hou, hu, hwu, from Old English hū, from Proto-West Germanic *hwō, from Proto-Germanic *hwō (“through what, how”), from the same root as hwæt (“who, what”). /hw/ > /h/ due to wh-cluster reduction in Old English; compare who, which underwent this change later, and thus is spelt wh (Middle English spelling of /hw/) but pronounced /h/ (it previously had a different vowel, hence avoided the spelling and sound change in Old English). Vowel change per Great Vowel Shift. Akin to Scots hoo, foo (“how”), North Frisian ho, hü, hur (“how”), Saterland Frisian wo (“how”), West Frisian hoe (“how”), Dutch hoe (“how”), Low German ho, wo, wu (“how”), German wie (“how”), Swedish hur (“how”). See who and compare why.

Forms

'ow hoo

Derived

and how anyhow any old how ask how high when someone says jump a straw shows how the wind blows boo how doy die how one lived die just how one lived don't teach your grandmother how to milk ducks don't try to teach grandma how to suck eggs everyhow forhow get it how one gets it get it how one lives get it how one lives it how about how about no how about that how about them apples how are things how are you how are you diddling how are you doing how are you getting along

Conjunction

  1. That, the fact that.
    • She told me how her father was a doctor.
    • “There’s this real Al Capone fear that they’re going to get our guys, not on marijuana, but on something else,” Mr. Edson said, referring to how Capone was eventually charged with tax evasion rather than criminal...

Forms

'ow hoo

Interjection US, dialectal

  1. What?, pardon?

Forms

'ow hoo

Interjection Entry 4

  1. A greeting, used in representations of Native American speech.

Origin

From a Siouan language; compare Lakota háu. Alternatively from Wyandot haau.

Forms

howgh 'ow hoo

Noun dialectal

  1. An artificial barrow or tumulus; in later folklore, associated with fairies.
    • Fianlly, as regards the places in which these rites and mysteries may have been held, certain writers believe them to have been the "Fairy Hills" or "howes" in various parts of Scotland. - 1928, Lewis Spence, Mysteries...
    • The fairy feast inside the howe (and this barrow is hill-sized) reminds one of nothing so much as a tale in the Icelandic Eyrbyggia saga, written in the mid thirteenth century. - 1985, Jennifer Westwood, Albion,...
    • Then, the story goes, a certain man plundered the hoard in that immemorial howe[.] - 1999, Seamus Heaney, Beowulf, London: Faber and Faber, page 87:
  2. In northern England, a low hill.

Origin

From Middle English howe, hough, hogh, partly from Old English hōh (“promontory”), and partly from Old Norse haugr (“a how, mound”). Compare Old French höe (“hillock, hill”), from the same Germanic source.

Forms

hows howe 'ow hoo

Noun Entry 6

  1. The means by which something is accomplished.
    • I am not interested in the why, but in the how.
    • It is an a posteriori argument, evincing the fact, but not the how. - 1924, Joseph Rickaby, Studies on God and His Creatures, page 102:
    • A wham-bam caper flick, efficiently directed by Roger Donaldson, that fancifully revisits the mysterious whos and speculative hows of a 1971 London bank heist. - 2008 March 21, The New York Times, “Movie Guide and Film...

Forms

hows how's 'ow hoo