Recourse Meaning
/ɹɪˈkɔːs/Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounThe act of seeking assistance or advice.
nounThe use of (someone or something) as a source of help in a difficult situation.
Sentence Examples
His last recourse will be to go to his father for help.
They had no other recourse but to apologize.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The worker sought ____ against the unfair decision by taking legal action.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
With no other options available, she had no ____ but to take the matter to court.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English recours (noun) and recoursen (verb), from Old French recours, from Latin recursus, past participle of recurrō.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Thus dyed this great Peer in the thirty sixth year of his age compleat, and three days over, in a time of great recourse unto him, and dependence upon him"
— 1678, Nathaniel Wanley, The Wonders of the Little World:
"All other means have fail'd to move her heart; / Our laſt recourſe is, therefore, to your Art."
— 1669 June (first performance), John Dryden, Tyrannick Love, or, The Royal Martyr. […], London: […] H[enry] Herringman, […], published 1670, →OCLC, Act IV, scene i, page 29:
"Tarzan would have liked to subdue the ugly beast without recourse to knife or arrows. So much had his great strength and agility increased in the period following his maturity that he had come to believe that he might master the redoubtable Terkoz in a hand to hand fight were it not for the terrible advantage the anthropoid's huge fighting fangs gave him over the poorly armed Tarzan."
— 1912 October, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “Tarzan of the Apes”, in The All-Story, New York, N.Y.: Frank A. Munsey Co., →OCLC; republished as “Man’s Reason”, in Tarzan of the Apes, New York, N.Y.: A[lbert] L[evi] Burt Company, June 1914, →OCLC, page 151:
"Nor were the wool prospects much better. The pastoral industry, which had weathered the severe depression of the early forties by recourse to boiling down the sheep for their tallow, and was now firmly re-established as the staple industry of the colony, was threatened once more with eclipse."
— 1929, M. Barnard Eldershaw, A House is Built, chapter VIII, section ii:
"This was done, and in many cases still is done by the main-line railway groups, through the exercise of running powers, which on application to Parliament by the company using them have been granted for the express purpose of affording this access without the necessity for building independent tracks. In other cases, such running powers have been granted without recourse to Parliament, by voluntary agreement between the parties."
— 1940 May, “The Why and the Wherefore: Running Powers”, in Railway Magazine, page 318:
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CEFR Practice Quiz
The worker sought ____ against the unfair decision by taking legal action.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
With no other options available, she had no ____ but to take the matter to court.