essence, heart and soul, inwardness, nitty-gritty, pith, gist, kernel, substance, nub, meat, sum, core, center, heart, marrow - the choicest or most essential or most vital part of some idea or experience; "the gist of the prosecutor's argument"; "the heart and soul of the Republican Party"; "the nub of the story"

plural, plural form - the form of a word that is used to denote more than one

colloquialism - a colloquial expression; characteristic of spoken or written communication that seeks to imitate informal speech