What is the difference between boyfriend and friend?
boyfriend | friend |
A male partner in a romantic relationship.
* 2012 , (Justin Bieber), Boyfriend
A male friend.
A person other than a family member, spouse or lover whose company one enjoys and towards whom one feels affection.
*
, title=(The Celebrity), chapter=1
, passage=However, with the dainty volume my quondam friend sprang into fame. At the same time he cast off the chrysalis of a commonplace existence.}}
A boyfriend or girlfriend.
An associate who provides assistance.
A person with whom one is vaguely or indirectly acquainted
* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-21, author=(Oliver Burkeman)
, volume=189, issue=2, page=27, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly)
, title= A person who backs or supports something.
(informal) An object or idea that can be used for good.
(colloquial, ironic, used only in the vocative) Used as a form of address when warning someone.
(computing, programming) In object-oriented programming, a function or class granted special access to the private and protected members of another class.
* 1991 , Tom Swan, Learning C++
* 2001 , Stephen Prata, C++ primer plus
* 2008 , D S Malik, C++ Programming: From Problem Analysis to Program Design
(obsolete) A paramour of either sex.
(obsolete) To act as a friend to, to befriend; to be friendly to, to help.
* 1596 , Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene , IV.ii:
To add (a person) to a list of friends on a social networking site; to officially designate (someone) as a friend.
* 2006 , David Fono and Kate Raynes-Goldie, "
* 2006 , Kevin Farnham and Dale G. Farnham, Myspace Safety: 51 Tips for Teens And Parents , How-To Primers, ISBN 0977883353, page
As nouns the difference between boyfriend and friend
is that boyfriend is a male partner in a romantic relationship while friend is a person other than a family member, spouse or lover whose company one enjoys and towards whom one feels affection.As a verb friend is
(obsolete) to act as a friend to, to befriend; to be friendly to, to help.boyfriend
English
Alternative forms
* boy friend (dated)Noun
(en noun)- If I was your boyfriend , I’d never let you go
I can take you places you ain’t never been before.
Synonyms
* (male friend) guyfriend (slang)Usage notes
In contrast to its female equivalent, girlfriend, which is often used to describe a woman's close female friends, the term is not that often used in reference to non-romantic relationships. Boyfriend is a relatively modern term, and in the past has had implications of an illicit relationship (as sexual and romantic relationships outside marriage were generally frowned upon). It is now a generally accepted term and has no negative implications. Use of boyfriend generally implies that the male is a boy or a young man. An older man in a non-marital relationship and sometimes even a young man in a long-term relationship is more often described as a significant other or partner. Separating the word into its two components boy friend'' avoids the romantic implication nowadays, although ''boy friend'' used to mean the same as ''boyfriend does now. However, British and Australian men usually refer to a male friend as a mate. Similarly, Americans and Canadians use the term buddy.See also
* * girlfriend * husband * lover * significant other ----friend
English
(Friendship)Noun
(en noun)The tao of tech, passage=The dirty secret of the internet is that all this distraction and interruption is immensely profitable. Web companies like to boast about […], or offering services that let you "stay up to date with what your friends are doing",
- But don't take the following sections as an endorsement of friends'. Top C++ programmers avoid using ' friends unless absolutely necessary.
- In that case, the function needn't (and shouldn't) be a friend .
- To make a function be a friend to a class, the reserved word
friendprecedes the function prototype
- (Shakespeare)
Synonyms
* (person whose company one enjoys) bud (qualifier), buddy (qualifier), chum (British), mate (British), pal, crony, amigo, bro * (boyfriend or girlfriend) boyfriend, girlfriend, lover * (person with whom you are acquainted) acquaintance * (person who provides assistance) ally * (person who backs something) admirer, booster, champion, protagonist, supporter * (form of address used in warning someone) buster, mate (British), pal, buddy * See alsoAntonyms
* (person whose company one enjoys) enemy, foe, nemesis (nonstandard) * (person who provides assistance) enemy, foeUsage notes
* We usually make a friend'', or ''make friends with someone. SeeDerived terms
* a friend in need is a friend indeed * best friend * befriend * bosom friend * boy friend * boyfriend * circle of friends * close friend * fair-weather friend * false friend * four-legged friend * * friend of mine * friend of ours * friend with benefits * friendish * friendless * friendly * Friends * friendship * friends list * friendsome * friend zone * girl friend * girlfriend * good friend * identification friend or foe * lady friend * man's best friend * old friend * penfriend, pen friend, pen-friend * schoolfriendVerb
(en verb)- Lo sluggish Knight the victors happie pray: / So fortune friends the bold [...].
Hyperfriendship and Beyond: Friends and Social Norms on LiveJournal]" ([http://k4t3.org/publications/hyperfriendship.pdf PDF version]), Internet Research Annual Volume 4 , Peter Lang, ISBN 0820478571, page [http://books.google.com/books?q=%22friend+them%22+consalvo&btnG=Search+Books 99,
- The difference between responses to the statement, "If someone friends' me, I will '''friend''' them," and "If I '''friend''' someone, I expect them to ' friend me back," is telling.
69,
- One of the most used features of MySpace is the practice that is nicknamed "friending." If you "friend " someone, then that person is added to your MySpace friends list, and you are added to their friends list.