Privacy

How to spell privacy

7 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce privacy

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does privacy mean?

1. nounThe state of being free from public attention or unwanted intrusion into one's personal affairs.

Privacy in a sentence

• The tall hedge gives the back garden a real sense of privacy.

• The new app asks for far too many permissions, which raises serious privacy concerns.

Where does privacy come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin privatus, meaning 'withdrawn from public life' or 'belonging to oneself', which was the past participle of privare, 'to deprive or set apart'. That same Latin root gives us 'private', and from 'private' English coined the noun 'privacy' in the late 1300s and 1400s to name the state of being apart from others or free from intrusion. The underlying idea in privare was literally to separate one person's affairs from the shared, public world. The spelling keeps the 'priv-' stem of 'private' intact and simply swaps the ending, which is the easiest way to remember it: think 'private' then add '-acy', not '-asy'. Interestingly, the pronunciation has split across the Atlantic, with British speakers often saying 'PRIV-' to rhyme with 'give' and American speakers saying 'PRY-', yet the spelling stayed identical everywhere.

How the word is built

• priv- (from privatus: set apart, private)
• -acy (noun suffix denoting state or quality)