Giving heart to sons at university breeding hogs (10)
I believe the answer is:
reassuring
'giving heart to' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both to do with human feelings as well as being present participle verbs.
Perhaps they are linked in a way I don't understand?
'sons at university breeding hogs' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'sons' could be 'ss' (s is abbreviation for son) and 'ss' is located in the answer.
'at' could be 'in' and 'in' is located in the answer.
'university' could be 'u' and 'u' is present in the answer.
This may be the basis of clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Another definition for reassuring that I've seen is " Allaying the doubts and fears of".)