Specific

How to spell specific

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce specific

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does specific mean?

1. adjectiveClearly defined, exact, or relating to one particular thing rather than something general.

Specific in a sentence

• The manager asked for a specific figure rather than a rough estimate.

• Each department has its own specific set of safety rules.

Where does specific come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word descends from the Late Latin specificus, meaning 'constituting a kind' or 'of a particular sort'. It was built from species, which originally meant 'appearance' or 'kind' (itself from specere, 'to look at'), combined with the ending -ficus from facere, 'to make'. The literal sense was therefore something that 'makes a kind', that is, something that marks one type out from another. English adopted it in the 1600s, first in scientific and medical writing, where a 'specific' remedy was one suited to a particular disease. From that precise, classifying use it broadened into the everyday meaning of 'exact' or 'clearly defined'. The same species root sits inside 'special', 'spice', and 'spectacles', all of them tracing back to the idea of looking and distinguishing.

How the word is built

• speci- (from species: kind, sort, appearance)
• -fic (making, from Latin facere: to make)