"back to basics" meaning in English

See back to basics in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Adverb

Etymology: From back + to + basics. Head templates: {{en-adv|-}} back to basics (not comparable)
  1. back to fundamental principles Tags: not-comparable Synonyms: back-to-basics
    Sense id: en-back_to_basics-en-adv-BMDDaBgv Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 54 46 Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 47 53 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 58 42

Noun

Etymology: From back + to + basics. Head templates: {{en-noun|-}} back to basics (uncountable)
  1. (politics, chiefly British) A conscious return to principles such as self-respect, decency and honesty; especially the discredited policy of the Conservative government in the 1990s. Tags: British, uncountable Categories (topical): Politics Related terms: Victorian values
    Sense id: en-back_to_basics-en-noun-QcvCawum Categories (other): British English, English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 54 46 Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 47 53 Topics: government, politics

Alternative forms

{
  "etymology_text": "From back + to + basics.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
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      "expansion": "back to basics (not comparable)",
      "name": "en-adv"
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  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adv",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "54 46",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
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          "source": "w+disamb"
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          "_dis": "58 42",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
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          "source": "w+disamb"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "You can't teach them calculus when they can't add up; let's get back to basics.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2014 November 14, Stephen Halliday, “Scotland 1-0 Republic of Ireland: Maloney the hero”, in The Scotsman:",
          "text": "While Strachan’s men have succeeded in adopting a more expansive, fluid style of play in recent times, it was very much a case of back to basics for this one.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "back to fundamental principles"
      ],
      "id": "en-back_to_basics-en-adv-BMDDaBgv",
      "links": [
        [
          "fundamental",
          "fundamental"
        ],
        [
          "principle",
          "principle"
        ]
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "_dis1": "78 22",
          "word": "back-to-basics"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "not-comparable"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "back to basics"
}

{
  "etymology_text": "From back + to + basics.",
  "head_templates": [
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
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          "parents": [],
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        },
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Politics",
          "orig": "en:Politics",
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            "All topics",
            "Fundamental"
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        },
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        }
      ],
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        "A conscious return to principles such as self-respect, decency and honesty; especially the discredited policy of the Conservative government in the 1990s."
      ],
      "id": "en-back_to_basics-en-noun-QcvCawum",
      "links": [
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        [
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          "conscious"
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        [
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          "return"
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        [
          "self-respect",
          "self-respect"
        ],
        [
          "decency",
          "decency"
        ],
        [
          "honesty",
          "honesty"
        ],
        [
          "discredit",
          "discredit"
        ],
        [
          "policy",
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        ],
        [
          "Conservative",
          "Conservative"
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      "raw_glosses": [
        "(politics, chiefly British) A conscious return to principles such as self-respect, decency and honesty; especially the discredited policy of the Conservative government in the 1990s."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "Victorian values"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "British",
        "uncountable"
      ],
      "topics": [
        "government",
        "politics"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "back to basics"
}
{
  "categories": [
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    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
    "English multiword terms",
    "English nouns",
    "English uncomparable adverbs",
    "English uncountable nouns",
    "Pages with 1 entry",
    "Pages with entries"
  ],
  "etymology_text": "From back + to + basics.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
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  "lang_code": "en",
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  "senses": [
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        "English terms with usage examples"
      ],
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        {
          "text": "You can't teach them calculus when they can't add up; let's get back to basics.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2014 November 14, Stephen Halliday, “Scotland 1-0 Republic of Ireland: Maloney the hero”, in The Scotsman:",
          "text": "While Strachan’s men have succeeded in adopting a more expansive, fluid style of play in recent times, it was very much a case of back to basics for this one.",
          "type": "quote"
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      ],
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    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "back-to-basics"
    }
  ],
  "word": "back to basics"
}

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    "Pages with entries"
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  "etymology_text": "From back + to + basics.",
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  "lang_code": "en",
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    {
      "word": "Victorian values"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
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        "A conscious return to principles such as self-respect, decency and honesty; especially the discredited policy of the Conservative government in the 1990s."
      ],
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          "politics",
          "politics"
        ],
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        [
          "self-respect",
          "self-respect"
        ],
        [
          "decency",
          "decency"
        ],
        [
          "honesty",
          "honesty"
        ],
        [
          "discredit",
          "discredit"
        ],
        [
          "policy",
          "policy"
        ],
        [
          "Conservative",
          "Conservative"
        ],
        [
          "government",
          "government"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(politics, chiefly British) A conscious return to principles such as self-respect, decency and honesty; especially the discredited policy of the Conservative government in the 1990s."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "British",
        "uncountable"
      ],
      "topics": [
        "government",
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      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "back-to-basics"
    }
  ],
  "word": "back to basics"
}

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This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-11-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-10-02 using wiktextract (fbeafe8 and 7f03c9b). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.