Automation

How to spell automation

10 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce automation

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does automation mean?

1. nounThe use of machines or software to perform tasks with little or no human involvement.

Automation in a sentence

• The factory invested in automation to speed up assembly.

• Office automation has replaced much of the routine paperwork.

Where does automation come from?

Language of origin: Greek

The word automation is a twentieth century coinage built from elements that reach back to Greek. The first part, auto-, comes from the Greek autos, meaning 'self', the same root that gives us automobile and autonomy. The second part echoes the Greek automatos, which literally meant 'acting of one's own will' or 'self-moving', the source of the older word automaton for a self-operating machine. The term automation itself was popularised in the American car industry around 1947, when a Ford executive used it to describe the automatic handling of parts through a production line. From manufacturing it spread quickly to computing and offices, so the modern sense, machinery or software doing work without constant human control, is recent even though its building blocks are ancient.

How the word is built

• auto- (self)
• mat (from Greek -matos, willing/acting)
• -ion (noun of action)