Synonyms/Hypernyms (Ordered by Estimated Frequency) of noun background

8 senses of background

Sense 1
background -- (a person's social heritage: previous experience or training; "he is a lawyer with a sports background")
       => inheritance, heritage -- (any attribute or immaterial possession that is inherited from ancestors; "my only inheritance was my mother's blessing"; "the world's heritage of knowledge")

Sense 2
background, ground -- (the part of a scene (or picture) that lies behind objects in the foreground; "he posed her against a background of rolling hills")
       => view, aspect, prospect, scene, vista, panorama -- (the visual percept of a region; "the most desirable feature of the park are the beautiful views")

Sense 3
background, background knowledge -- (information that is essential to understanding a situation or problem; "the embassy filled him in on the background of the incident")
       => information -- (knowledge acquired through study or experience or instruction)

Sense 4
background, background signal -- (extraneous signals that can be confused with the phenomenon to be observed or measured; "they got a bad connection and could hardly hear one another over the background signals")
       => noise, interference, disturbance -- (electrical or acoustic activity that can disturb communication)

Sense 5
background -- (relatively unimportant or inconspicuous accompanying situation; "when the rain came he could hear the sound of thunder in the background")
       => accompaniment, concomitant, attendant, co-occurrence -- (an event or situation that happens at the same time as or in connection with another)

Sense 6
setting, background, scope -- (the state of the environment in which a situation exists; "you can't do that in a university setting")
       => environment -- (the totality of surrounding conditions; "he longed for the comfortable environment of his living room")

Sense 7
background, desktop, screen background -- ((computer science) the area of the screen in graphical user interfaces against which icons and windows appear)
       => screen, CRT screen -- (the display that is electronically created on the surface of the large end of a cathode-ray tube)

Sense 8
backdrop, background, backcloth -- (scenery hung at back of stage)
       => scenery, scene -- (the painted structures of a stage set that are intended to suggest a particular locale; "they worked all night painting the scenery")

Antonyms of verb background

1 sense of background

Sense 1
background, play down, downplay -- (understate the importance or quality of; "he played down his royal ancestry")
       Antonym of foreground (Sense 1)
      => foreground, highlight, spotlight, play up -- (move into the foreground to make more visible or prominent; "The introduction highlighted the speaker's distinguished career in linguistics")

Synonyms/Hypernyms (Ordered by Estimated Frequency) of verb background

1 sense of background

Sense 1
background, play down, downplay -- (understate the importance or quality of; "he played down his royal ancestry")
       => stress, emphasize, emphasise, punctuate, accent, accentuate -- (to stress, single out as important; "Dr. Jones emphasizes exercise in addition to a change in diet")