<B>whodunit, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Slang.) a story, motion picture, or play, dealing with crime, especially murder, and its detection. </DL>
<A NAME="whoever">
<B>whoever, </B>pronoun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>any person that; who. <BR> <I>Ex. Whoever wants the book may have it.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>no matter who. <BR> <I>Ex. Whoever else goes hungry, he won't.</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>(Informal.) (as an interrogative pronoun implying perplexity or surprise) who. <BR> <I>Ex. Whoever could have done such a dreadful thing?</I> </DL>
<A NAME="whole">
<B>whole, </B>adjective, adverb, noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><I>adj. </I> <B>1. </B>making up or being the full quantity, amount, extent, or number; entire. <BR> <I>Ex. to tell the whole story, to give a matter one's whole attention. He worked the whole day. He ate the whole melon. The whole state was hit by the hurricane.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>having all its parts or elements; complete; full. <BR> <I>Ex. He gave her a whole set of dishes.</I> (SYN) perfect, intact. <DD><B> 3. </B>not injured, broken, or defective. <BR> <I>Ex. He came out of the fight with a whole skin.</I> (SYN) unimpaired, uninjured, unbroken. <DD><B> 4. </B>in one piece; undivided. <BR> <I>Ex. The dog swallowed the meat whole.</I> <DD><B> 5. </B>being fully or entirely such. <BR> <I>Ex. a whole brother or sister (a son or daughter of both parents).</I> <DD><B> 6. </B>(Mathematics.) not fractional; integral. <BR> <I>Ex. a whole number.</I> <DD><B> 7a. </B>well; healthy. (SYN) hale, sound. <DD><B> b. </B>(Archaic.) restored to good health, as from disease, an injury, or a wound; well again. <DD><B> c. </B>(Obsolete.) (of a wound) healed. <DD><I>adv. </I> (Informal.) completely; entirely. <BR> <I>Ex. "It was a whole different world then," she says regretfully (New York Times Magazine).</I> <DD><I>noun </I> <B>1. </B>all of a thing; the total. <BR> <I>Ex. Four quarters make a whole.</I> (SYN) entirety, aggregate, sum. <DD><B> 2. </B>something complete in itself; system. <BR> <I>Ex. the complex whole of civilization.</I> <BR><I>expr. <B>as a whole,</B> </I>as one complete thing; altogether. <BR> <I>Ex. The public must be represented when the wage bargains are struck because the nation as a whole is an interested third party (Manchester Guardian Weekly).</I> <BR><I>expr. <B>on</B> (or <B>upon</B>) <B>the whole,</B> <DD><B> a. </B>considering everything; in sum. </I> <I>Ex. [I] determined that the Alps were, on the whole, best seen from below (John Ruskin).</I> <DD><B> b. </B>in general; for the most part. <BR> <I>Ex. But on the whole the people of Coronation Street don't bother about the outside world (Maclean's).</I> noun <B>wholeness.</B> </DL>
<A NAME="wholeblood">
<B>whole blood,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> natural blood with none of the essential components removed. </DL>
<A NAME="wholegale">
<B>whole gale,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a wind with a velocity of 55 to 63 miles (89 to 102 kilometers) per hour on the Beaufort scale. </DL>
<B>whole-hog, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Slang.) that goes the whole hog; thoroughgoing; unlimited. <BR> <I>Ex. Anything less than whole-hog public ownership would seem like backsliding (New Yorker).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="wholehogger">
<B>whole-hogger, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Slang.) a person who goes the whole hog. </DL>
<A NAME="wholelanguage">
<B>whole language,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a method of teaching language arts, based on language skills already acquired by a pupil. <BR> <I>Ex. Many teachers are experimenting with the "whole language" approach, which says that reading, writing and vocabulary are best taught together (Lynda Richardson).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="wholely">
<B>wholely, </B>adverb. <B>=wholly.</B></DL>
<A NAME="wholemeal">
<B>whole-meal, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>made of the entire wheat grain kernels. <BR> <I>Ex. whole-meal flour.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>made of whole-meal flour. </DL>
<A NAME="wholemilk">
<B>whole milk,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> milk from which none of the natural constituents have been removed. </DL>
<A NAME="wholenote">
<B>whole note,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a note to be given as much time as four quarter notes; the longest duration of sound commonly encountered in music today; semibreve. It is the standard unit of time measurement in modern music notation. </DL>
<A NAME="wholenumber">
<B>whole number,</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a number denoting one or more whole things or units; integer. 1, 2, 3, 15, 106 are whole numbers; 1/2, 3/4, and 7/8 are fractions; 1 3/8, 2 1/2, and 12 2/3 are mixed numbers. <DD><B> 2. </B>a positive integer or zero. The set of whole numbers is usually {0, 1, 2, 3, ...}, 0 sometimes being excluded. </DL>
<A NAME="wholerest">
<B>whole rest,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Music.) a rest as long as a whole note. </DL>
<A NAME="wholesale">
<B>wholesale, </B>noun, adjective, adverb, verb, <B>-saled,</B> <B>-saling.</B><DL COMPACT><DD><I>noun </I> the sale of goods in large quantities at a time, usually to storekeepers or others who will in turn sell them in small quantities to users. <BR> <I>Ex. They buy at wholesale and sell at retail.</I> <DD><I>adj. </I> <B>1. </B>in large lots or quantities. <BR> <I>Ex. The wholesale price of this coat is $22; the retail price is $30.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>selling in large quantities. <BR> <I>Ex. a wholesale merchant, a wholesale house, a wholesale fruit business.</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>(Figurative.) broad and general; extensive and indiscriminate. <BR> <I>Ex. Avoid wholesale condemnation.</I> (SYN) sweeping, unlimited. <DD><I>adv. </I> in large lots or quantities; at or by wholesale. <BR> <I>Ex. to buy something wholesale.</I> <DD><I>v.t. </I> to sell in large quantities. <BR> <I>Ex. They wholesale these jackets at $10 each. New car dealers are using their good trade-ins instead of wholesaling them (Wall Street Journal).</I> <DD><I>v.i. </I> to be sold in large quantities. <BR> <I>Ex. Such jackets usually wholesale for much less.</I> <BR><I>expr. <B>by wholesale,</B> <DD><B> a. </B>in large quantities. </I> <I>Ex. a commodity sold by wholesale.</I> <DD><B> b. </B>(Figurative.) in a large way and indiscriminately. <BR> <I>Ex. They despise a valuable book, and ... throw contempt upon it by wholesale (Isaac Watts).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="wholesalepriceindex">
<B>wholesale price index,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (U.S.) a list of prices paid for a representative number of goods in various cities during a given month compared with average prices paid in a recent base period. It is compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. </DL>
<A NAME="wholesaler">
<B>wholesaler, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a wholesale merchant. </DL>
<A NAME="wholesnipe">
<B>whole snipe,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> the common snipe of Europe. </DL>
<A NAME="wholesome">
<B>wholesome, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>good for the health; healthful. <BR> <I>Ex. Milk is a wholesome food.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>suggesting good health; healthy-looking. <BR> <I>Ex. She has a clean, wholesome face.</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>good for the mind or morals; beneficial. <BR> <I>Ex. She reads only wholesome books.</I> <DD><B> 4. </B>free from disease or taint. <BR> <I>Ex. Ere the wholesome flesh decay (A. E. Housman).</I> adv. <B>wholesomely.</B> noun <B>wholesomeness.</B> </DL>
<B>whole step,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Music.) an interval of two half steps, and equal to one sixth of an octave, such as D to E, or E to F#; major second. </DL>
<B>whole-tone scale,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Music.) a scale proceeding in whole steps, dividing the octave into six equal parts, used in the first decade of the 1900's. </DL>
<A NAME="wholewheat">
<B>whole-wheat, </B>adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>made of the entire wheat kernel. <BR> <I>Ex. whole-wheat flour.</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>made from whole-wheat flour. <BR> <I>Ex. whole-wheat bread.</I> </DL>
<B>wholly, </B>adverb.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>to the whole amount or extent; completely; entirely; totally; altogether. <BR> <I>Ex. to be wholly finished. The sick boy was wholly cured.</I> (SYN) utterly. <DD><B> 2. </B>as a whole; in its entirety; in full. <BR> <I>Ex. A man who can see truth at all, sees it wholly, and neither desires nor dares to mutilate it (John Ruskin).</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>exclusively; solely. <BR> <I>Ex. A creature wholly given to brawls and wine (Tennyson).</I> (SYN) only. </DL>
<A NAME="whom">
<B>whom, </B>pronoun.<DL COMPACT><DD> the objective case of <B>who.</B> what person; which person. <BR> <I>Ex. Whom do you like best? He does not know whom to believe. The girl to whom you spoke is my cousin.</I> </DL>
<A NAME="whomever">
<B>whomever, </B>pronoun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>whom; any person whom. <DD><B> 2. </B>no matter whom. </DL>
<A NAME="whomp">
<B>whomp, </B>noun, verb.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Informal.) <DD><I>noun </I> a loud outburst of sound. <BR> <I>Ex. the whomp and hiss of exploding firecrackers.</I> <DD><I>v.i. </I> to hit or fall with such a sound; thump. <BR> <I>Ex. The Sunday edition of the New York Times ... whomped to the floor outside my apartment door (New Scientist).</I> <DD><I>v.t. </I> <B>1. </B>to beat or knock down with such a sound. <BR> <I>Ex. jailed and systematically whomped by the local police (New York Times).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>to defeat; drub. <BR> <I>Ex. The whomping the Republicans and we conservatives took in this past election hurts (Wall Street Journal).</I> <DD> Also, <B>whump.</B> <BR><I>expr. <B>whomp up,</B> </I>(Informal.) to produce or accomplish quickly; knock up. <BR> <I>Ex. to whomp up a new sales approach, to whomp up a crisis.</I> </DL>
