analogize

Other forms: analogizing; analogizes

When you analogize, you explain one thing by comparing it to another. You make an analogy. If you say that DNA is like a twisted ladder, you analogize to make it easier for someone to imagine.

The word analogize comes from the Greek analogizesthai which basically means "to sum up." When you analogize something, you sum it up by making a comparison. In literature, similes and metaphors are used to analogize. The poet Robert Burns analogizes when he writes, "My love is like a red, red rose." If a babysitter complains, "These kids are like a pack of wild dogs," he analogizes the kids and dogs. And he probably won’t be back.