Word.ws English Dictionary

upturning

upturning is the present participle and gerund of upturn.

Meaning of upturn

Verb

upturn (third-person singular simple present upturns, present participle upturning, simple past and past participle upturned)

  1. (ambitransitive) To turn (something) up or over.
    • Near-synonym: turn over

See all 2 meanings of upturn

Noun

upturning (plural upturnings)

  1. A turning upward.
    • He suffered from frequent 'micro-crises' — upturnings of the eyeballs, associated with transient inability to move or respond; these lasted a few seconds only, and occurred dozens, and sometimes hundreds, of times a day.1973, Oliver Sacks, Awakenings

Forms of upturning

pluralupturnings

Origin of upturning

From upturn + -ing.

From Middle English upturnynge, equivalent to upturn + -ing and/or up- + turning.

Questions about upturning

What does upturning mean?
Upturning means a turning upward.
What is upturning the present participle and gerund of?
Upturning is the present participle and gerund of upturn.
What part of speech is upturning?
Upturning is a noun.
What is the plural of upturning?
The plural of upturning is upturnings.

Words near upturning in the dictionary

  1. uptune
  2. uptunes
  3. upturn
  4. upturned
  5. upturneth
  6. upturning
  7. upturnings
  8. upturns
  9. uptwirl
  10. uptwirled
  11. uptwirling

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: upturning (page history and authors); upturn (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “upturning.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/upturning. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.