table
A piece of furniture with a flat top and legs.
Table can mean several things:
- A piece of furniture with a flat top supported by legs. Tables give us surfaces to work, eat, or play on. You might do homework at a kitchen table, eat lunch at a cafeteria table, or play board games at a coffee table. Tables come in countless shapes and sizes: round tables, rectangular tables, tiny nightstand tables, and huge conference tables where business meetings happen.
- An organized arrangement of information in rows and columns. A multiplication table shows math facts in a grid that makes them easy to find and memorize. A table of contents lists chapter titles and page numbers. Scientists use tables to record their experimental data. When information gets complicated, putting it in a table can make it clearer and easier to compare.
- To formally present something for discussion. In some places, when people table a topic during a meeting, they bring it up so everyone can talk about it.
- To postpone discussing something. In other places, when people table a topic during a meeting, they decide to set it aside and return to it later. “Let's table that question until next week” can mean “Let's wait to discuss this,” depending on where you are.
The phrase turn the tables means to reverse a situation, often by gaining an advantage over someone who previously had the upper hand. If you're losing a chess game but then capture your opponent's queen and start winning, you've turned the tables.