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Glite Dictionary
🌱 To branch out 🔗 To spread consequences
to ramify

to ramify

1 8.9
To develop into many connected problems across a group or system
  • verb
  • /ˈræməˌfaɪ/
  • Formal
translation icon : tener repercusiones
  • This duplicity ramifies throughout Barthes's work, and much remains to be said about it.

So something happens, it ramifies, it has consequences.

Examples

  • We know that population growth has complex and ramifying welfare effects on society.

    Academic text (1998)

  • It's all about those ramifying effects.

    Blog text (25)

  • So something happens, it ramifies, it has consequences.

    Film Courage

  • One movement has ramifying consequences in a manner more complicated than other sports, I'd argue.

    Blog text (25)

  • The moral, one senses, is beholden to something beyond pleasure and may ramify in unpredictable and potentially off-putting ways.

    Academic text (2009)

  • The decision to cut funding for education can ramify, leading to a decline in student performance and increased dropout rates.

  • When a policy changes, it often ramifies into various sectors, affecting everything from healthcare to employment.

  • The conflict in the region began to ramify, with new alliances forming and tensions escalating across neighboring countries.

Synonyms

to ramify into
vsto ramify
8.4

Spread into several related parts or areas

develops into more numerous or complicated consequences and results

Antonyms

to simplify
99 2.5

Make something easier to understand or use

Phrasal Verbs

to ramify efforts
8.4

To spread work into new areas or different goals

to ramify into
8.4

Spread into several related parts or areas

How Far-Reaching

to snowball
15 3.9
to ramify
  • Formal
1 8.9
to lead to
∞ 2.5
to result
966 1.6
to cause
∞ 1.0

Surface Forms

ramify infinitive
ramified past
ramified past participle
ramifying present participle
ramifies third person singular

Morphology

ramify = rami + ify

Built from the Latin combining form 'rami-' (branch) plus the verb-forming suffix '-ify'; because 'rami-' is not a standalone English base, learners cannot reliably infer the metaphorical sense of spreading/branching from familiar English components.

Etymology

Ramify comes from the Latin ramus meaning 'branch'. A helpful image is one event sending out many small 'branches' of result, so to ramify is for a situation or action to develop and spread into more and more consequences.