Imitate vs Mimic - What's the difference?
imitate | mimic |
To follow as a model or a pattern; to make a copy, counterpart or semblance of.
* 1870 , Shirley Hibberd, Rustic Adornments for Homes of Taste (page 170)
To copy.
To imitate, especially in order to ridicule.
* {{quote-magazine, title=A better waterworks, date=2013-06-01, volume=407, issue=8838
, page=5 (Technology Quarterly), magazine=(The Economist)
(biology) To take on the appearance of another, for protection or camouflage.
Pertaining to mimicry; imitative.
*, II.12:
* Milton
* Wordsworth
Mock, pretended.
(mineralogy) Imitative; characterized by resemblance to other forms; applied to crystals which by twinning resemble simple forms of a higher grade of symmetry.
As verbs the difference between imitate and mimic
is that imitate is to follow as a model or a pattern; to make a copy, counterpart or semblance of while mimic is to imitate, especially in order to ridicule.As a noun mimic is
a person who practices mimicry, or mime.As an adjective mimic is
pertaining to mimicry; imitative.imitate
English
Verb
(imitat)- Another bird quickly learned to imitate the song of a canary that was mated with it, but as the parrakeet improved in the performance the canary degenerated, and came at last to mingle the other bird's harsh chitterings with its own proper music.
Synonyms
* See alsoAntonyms
* createExternal links
* * ----mimic
English
Alternative forms
* mimickVerb
citation, passage=An artificial kidney these days still means a refrigerator-sized dialysis machine. Such devices mimic the way real kidneys cleanse blood and eject impurities and surplus water as urine.}}
Synonyms
* See alsoAdjective
(en adjective)- I think every man is cloied and wearied, with seeing so many apish and mimicke trickes, that juglers teach their Dogges, as the dances, where they misse not one cadence of the sounds or notes they heare.
- Oft, in her absence, mimic fancy wakes / To imitate her.
- Mimic hootings.
