Misdemeanor

How to spell misdemeanor

11 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce misdemeanor

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does misdemeanor mean?

1. nounA minor crime that is less serious than a felony and usually carries a lighter penalty.

Misdemeanor in a sentence

• Shoplifting a low-value item is usually charged as a misdemeanor.

• His background check showed only a single misdemeanor from his college years.

Where does misdemeanor come from?

Language of origin: French

This word joins the prefix mis-, meaning 'wrong' or 'badly', to 'demeanor', an old word for conduct or behaviour. 'Demeanor' itself goes back through Middle English to the Old French verb demener, meaning 'to lead, manage, or conduct oneself', which in turn rests on the Latin minare, 'to drive animals', a sense that grew out of minari, 'to threaten'. So a misdemeanor is literally a case of behaving badly, of conducting oneself in the wrong way. By the fifteenth century English had narrowed the term into the law courts, where it came to mean a minor offence ranked below the more serious felony. The American spelling drops the 'u' that British and Canadian writers keep in 'misdemeanour', and that missing 'u' is the usual spelling trap.

How the word is built

• mis- (wrong, badly)
• demeanor (conduct, behaviour)
• -or (noun ending)

British and American spelling

Misdemeanor is the American spelling. British English spells it misdemeanour.