Modernity

How to spell modernity

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce modernity

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does modernity mean?

1. nounThe quality or condition of being modern; the character of contemporary life and thought.

Modernity in a sentence

• The architect blended modernity with traditional brickwork in the new library.

• The essay examines how modernity reshaped family life across the twentieth century.

Where does modernity come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word traces back to the Latin adverb modo, meaning 'just now' or 'recently', which gave rise to the late Latin adjective modernus, used to describe what belonged to the present age rather than to the ancients. From modernus came the abstract noun modernitas, the quality of being current. English borrowed the form through French modernité, which carried the same sense of belonging to the contemporary moment. The adjective 'modern' settled into English in the 1500s, and 'modernity' followed as the abstract noun for the condition or character of being modern. Because the stem is simply 'modern' plus the familiar '-ity' ending, the main spelling trap is the unstressed vowel before the final '-ity', which sounds like a faint schwa rather than the clear 'i' that is written.

How the word is built

• modern (from Latin modernus: of the present time)
• -ity (noun suffix forming a quality or state)