are
are Lexical Profile
are Game Scores & Validity
• verb
To exist, live, or occur in a specified state, quality, identity, or location (used as the second-person singular and plural and first- and third-person plural present indicative of 'be').
"They are very excited about starting the new academic semester."
To serve as an auxiliary verb with a present participle to form continuous tenses or with a past participle to form the passive voice (used in the second-person singular and plural and first- and third-person plural present indicative of 'be').
"All the laboratory samples are being tested by the research team today."
• noun
A metric unit of land area equal to 100 square meters (1/100 of a hectare, or approximately 119.6 square yards).
"The small community garden measured exactly five ares in total area."
Word Nuance & Usage
In standard English, the verb 'are' is the present indicative form of 'be' used with 'you', 'we', 'they', and plural noun subjects; in informal speech and writing, it is sometimes confused with the possessive determiner 'our' due to similar pronunciation in rapid speech.
• Rhymes for are
Word Origin & Etymology
The verb form derives from Old English 'earun' (Mercian) and 'aron' (Northumbrian), Reinforced by Old Norse 'eru', ultimately from the Proto-Indo-European root *er-. The metric noun was borrowed from French 'are', coined in 1795 from Latin 'area' meaning 'vacant piece of level ground'.