crisis

From Latin crisis, from Ancient Greek κρίσις (krísis, “a separating, power of distinguishing, decision, choice, election, judgment, dispute”), from κρίνω (krínō, “pick out, choose, decide, judge”).

• (Received Pronunciation, General American, Canada) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹaɪsɪs/

  • Audio (London):

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  • Audio (California):

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• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /ˈkɹɑɪsɪs/
• Rhymes: -aɪsɪs

crisis (plural crises)

1. A crucial or decisive point or situation; a turning point.
2. An unstable situation, in political, social, economic or military affairs, especially one involving an impending abrupt change.
   • 2011 January 25, Dave Clarke, “Panel says financial crisis avoidable”, in Reuters‎^[1], archived from the original on 22 July 2025:

     The financial crisis could have been avoided and was the result of poor decision making both in Washington and at top financial firms that fostered a culture of excessive risk taking, according to a draft report written by Democrats on a panel that investigated the meltdown and obtained by Reuters.

   • 2011 August 7, Paul Krugman, “A Self-Fulfilling Euro Crisis? (Wonkish)”, in The New York Times‎^[2], archived from the original on 11 July 2022:

     The big question, I believe, is whether the Italian and maybe Spanish crises are the kind of thing that might be brought under control by ECB bond purchases. This is often phrased in terms of whether they are facing liquidity or solvency problems; but I think it’s better phrased in terms of the possibility of self-fulfilling crises, a la Obstfeld. […] So there is a reasonable case that what we’re seeing in Italy is a self-fulfilling crisis trying to happen, in which fear of default is precisely what leads to default.

   • 2018, Steven Pinker, “Chapter 3: Counter-Enlightenments”, in Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress, Penguin, →ISBN:

     Are they right? Is pessimism correct? Could the state of the world, like the stripes on a barbershop pole, keep sinking lower and lower? It’s easy to see why people feel that way: every day the news is filled with stories about war, terrorism, crime, pollution, inequality, drug abuse, and oppression. And it’s not just the headlines we’re talking about; it’s the op-eds and long-form stories as well. Magazine covers warn us of coming anarchies, plagues, epidemics, collapses, and so many “crises” (farm, health, retirement, welfare, energy, deficit) that copywriters have had to escalate to the redundant “serious crisis.” Whether or not the world really is getting worse, the nature of news will interact with the nature of cognition to make us think that it is. News is about things that happen, not things that don’t happen.

3. (medicine) A sudden change in the course of a disease, usually at which point the patient is expected to either recover or die.
4. (psychology) A traumatic or stressful change in a person's life.

   I'm having a major crisis trying to wallpaper the living room.

5. (drama) A point in a drama at which a conflict reaches a peak before being resolved.

• “crisis”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “crisis”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “crisis”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

crisis f (plural crisis)

1. crisis

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic, Valencia) [ˈkɾi.zis]
• Rhymes: -izis

crisis

1. plural of crisi

Borrowed from Latin crisis, from Ancient Greek κρίσις (krísis).

• IPA^(key): /ˈkri.zɪs/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: cri‧sis

crisis f (plural crises or crisissen, diminutive crisisje n)

1. crisis
2. financial crisis

• kritiek
• kritisch

• → Indonesian: krisis

Borrowed from Ancient Greek κρίσις (krísis, “a separating, power of distinguishing, decision, choice, election, judgment, dispute”).

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈkrɪ.sɪs]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈkriː.s̬is]

crĭsis f (genitive crĭsis); third declension

1. crisis
   • 65 AD, Seneca, Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium‎^[3], published 1925, page 83.4:

     Hic quidem ait nos eandem crisin habere, quia utrique dentes cadunt.

     He said that we indeed have the same crisis, because both of us are losing teeth.

• The genitive is crisis and the accusative is crisin in dictionaries.

Third-declension noun (Greek-type, i-stem).

¹Found sometimes in Medieval and New Latin.

• → Dutch: crisis
• → English: crisis
• → Old French: crisis f
• → Spanish: crisis f

• “crisis”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “crisis”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.

Borrowed from Latin crisis.

crisis oblique singular, f (oblique plural crisis, nominative singular crisis, nominative plural crisis)

1. crisis, emergency; urgent situation

From Latin crisis, from Ancient Greek κρίσις (krísis, “a separating, power of distinguishing, decision, choice, election, judgment, dispute”), from κρίνω (krínō, “pick out, choose, decide, judge”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈkɾisis/ [ˈkɾi.sis]

• Audio (Argentina):

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• Audio (Latin America):

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• Rhymes: -isis
• Syllabification: cri‧sis

crisis f (plural crisis)

1. crisis
   • 2024 October 20, EFE, “Nueva caravana migrante con miles de personas sale de la frontera sur de México hacia Estados Unidos”, in CNN en Español‎^[4]:

     Miles de migrantes, en su mayoría venezolanos que salieron de su país tras la crisis electoral desatada a finales de julio, partieron este domingo en una nueva caravana denominada “El Niño”, desde la frontera sur de México, con destino a Estados Unidos.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

2. attack; fit

• “crisis”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025