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teens

Noun
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

teens: An archaic literary term for sorrows, troubles, grief, or afflictions, not to be confused with the modern meaning of adolescent youth; it signifies deep emotional distress.

Detailed Definition
In older literary English, “teens” can mean griefs or troubles. In Hardy’s phrase “Travails and teens,” it forms a list of burdens surrounding human life.
Example
Example in poetry:
“The Doomsters heap travails and teens around us here” uses teens in an older sense of sorrows, injuries, or troubles; “He bore the teens of war without complaint” illustrates the archaic plural; “Ballads speak of weal and teen, joy and suffering” shows its traditional contrast; Modern imitation: “No teen of mine could dim the morning’s fire.”
Additional Notes
The quoted “Travails and teens” uses “teens” in an archaic sense unrelated to the familiar modern meaning of teenagers.; Found in the poem, To an Unborn Pauper Child by Thomas Hardy
Also Known As
adolescence youth teenage years
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