to cotton to
3
9.0
- phrasal verb
- /ˈkɑtən tu/
- UK
:
acostumbrarse a
- Lots of things you didn't much cotton to her kids in the beginning, right.
- cotton to the idea
- never cottoned to
Because I don't cotton to people who feed their cats kibble.
- Because I don't cotton to people who feed their cats kibble.
Examples
-
She usually takes a while to cotton to new ideas, but she eventually comes around.
-
I sure do cotton to your Thanksgiving table.
Blog text (29) -
We don't cotton to it no how.
-
Of course, most people won't cotton to this belief, at least not publicly.
Blog text (31) -
She cottons to me already.
-
They don't cotton to outsiders, I guess.
-
Now, I don't cotton to stowaways aboard my good ship Delta Burke.
-
I've got an English setter myself, so I don't cotton to dog killers.
-
I don't cotton to his attitude; it feels insincere.
-
Many people don't cotton to the notion of working from home all the time.
Synonyms
16
5.6
To accept something or respond to it in a friendly way
8
4.9
Start to like someone or something more over time
Antonyms
How Liked
Surface Forms
Morphology
cotton + to
The literal meanings of 'cotton' (a textile/fiber) and the particle 'to' provide no compositional clue to 'begin to like/accept'; this is an idiomatic, language-specific usage whose sense cannot be derived from the parts. As an informal idiom, it is not predictably transparent cross-linguistically, so a B1 learner knowing the constituents would not reliably infer the meaning.
Etymology
Cotton to may come from the image of cotton fibres that stick to cloth. If something 'cottons to' you, it 'sticks' to you in a good way, so you begin to 'like' or 'accept' it.