syn-, sy-, sym-, syl-, sys-

1. A figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole (as hand for sailor), the whole for a part (as the law for police officer or "all hands on deck" is an example in which hands is used to mean sailors and deck means ship), the specific for the general (as cutthroat for assassin or head for cattle), the general for the specific (as thief for pickpocket), or the material for the thing made from it (as steel for sword).
2. Etymology: from "part for whole" or "vice versa," from Middle Latin synodoche, from Late Latin synecdoche, which came from Greek synekdokhe; literally, "a receiving together" or "jointly" from synekdekhesthai, "supply a thought or word, take with something else"; from syn- "with" + ek, "out" + dekhesthai, "to receive".

When Robert Frost, the poet, called himself a "synecdochist", he meant that in himself as an individual was figured the common experience of the human race and vice versa.

1. The structure, development, and distribution of communities in relation to their environments.
2. The study of plant or animal communities.

An encephalocele or a hernia of the brain with adhesions.

Fetal or newborn equally conjoined twins with synencephaly.

A condition in which equally conjoined twins have two bodies and a single head.