reader

From Middle English reder, redar, redere, redare, from Old English rēdere, rǣdere (“a reader; scholar; diviner”), from Proto-West Germanic *rādāri, equivalent to read +‎ -er. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Räider (“advisor”), Dutch rader (“advisor”), German Rater (“advisor”).

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɹidɚ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈɹiːdə/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iːdə(ɹ)

reader (plural readers)

1. A person who reads.

   an early reader, a talented reader

2. A person who reads a publication.

   10,000 weekly readers

3. A person who recites literary works, usually to an audience.
4. A proofreader.

   Synonyms: proofreader, printer's reader

6. A person employed by a publisher to read works submitted for publication and determine their merits.

   Synonyms: publisher's reader, first reader

   • 1938, Xavier Herbert, chapter VIII, in Capricornia‎^[1], page 123:

     They were dog-eared by the hands of many a publisher's-reader and postman.

7. A position attached to aristocracy, or to the wealthy, with the task of reading aloud, often in a foreign language.
   • 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], Francesca Carrara. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, pages 83–84:

     "I am commissioned by the Queen to offer you the place of Italian reader; and I assure you the offer was made with many kind expressions of interest. You will enter upon the duties, which are almost nominal, immediately."

8. (chiefly British) A university lecturer ranking below a professor.
9. Any device that reads something.

   a card reader, a microfilm reader

10. A book of exercises to accompany a textbook.
11. An elementary textbook for those learning to read, especially for foreign languages.

    Appletons’ School Readers

12. A literary anthology.
    • 1981 December 1, Thomas Hopkinson, “Streetboy Dreams; The Boy Harlequin and Other Stories (review)”, in Gay Community News, volume 12, number 20, page 10:

      A good bedtime reader should entertain and delight, and that's what I find in Girard Kent's The Boy Harleqin ^[sic] and Other Stories.

13. A lay or minor cleric who reads lessons in a church service.
14. (advertising) A newspaper advertisement designed to look like a news article rather than a commercial solicitation.

    Synonym: reading notice

15. (in the plural) Reading glasses.
16. (slang, gambling, in the plural) Marked playing cards used by cheaters.
    • 1961, United States. Congress. Senate. Government Operations, Gambling and Organized Crime, Parts 1, 2, 3. 87-1, page 286:

      LUMINOUS READERS—Marked cards that can be read only through tinted glasses.

    • 1991, John Bowyer Bell, Barton Whaley, Cheating and Deception, page 185:

      Of the 150,000,000 decks of cards sold each year in America, Scarne estimates that 1 percent get marked at some point. Yet, as he discovered in his 1972 gambling survey, only 2 percent of average players have any idea of how to detect these "readers."

17. (obsolete, slang) A wallet or pocketbook.
    • 1846, George William MacArthur Reynolds, The Mysteries of London, page 60:

      […] Q was a Queer-screen, that served as a blind; / R was a Reader, with flimsies well lined; […]

18. At Eton College, a lesson for which pupils are sent back to their separate school houses.

• dearer, re-read, reared, reread