Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Infancy |
InfancyNoun1. The early stage of growth or development. 2. The earliest state of immaturity. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "infancy" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1258. (references) |
Etymology: Infancy \In"fan*cy\, noun. [Latin expression infantia: compare to the French expression enfance. See Infant.]. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Satire | INFANCY, n. The period of our lives when, according to Wordsworth, "Heaven lies about us." The world begins lying about us pretty soon afterward. Source: Devil's Dictionary. |
Medicine | The period of complete dependency prior to the acquisition of competence in walking, talking and self-feeding. Source: European Union. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Defense of infancy refers to a form of defense by excuse; in which a defendant argues that, at the time a law was broken, they were not criminally liable for their actionss, as they had not reached an age of criminal responsibility. Many courts recognize that juvenile defendants may receive mitigated criminal sentence, and should they be young enough, prosecution may not be allowed at all.Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Defense of infancy."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Infant comes from the Latin in-fans, meaning unable to speak. It is commonly used as a slightly more formal word for baby (the youngest category of child). A newborn baby is known as a neonate.
Infant mortality is the death of infants in the first year of life. Major causes of infant mortality include congenital malformation, infection and SIDS. Neonatal mortality is a subcategory which only includes deaths in the first 27 days of life. Post-neonatal death is a subcategory which only includes deaths after 28 days of life but before one year. "Infant mortality" can also refer to the high failure rate of newly manufactured mechanical or electrical equipment, see repair and maintenance. Infant mortality rate is the number of newborns dying under a year of age divided by the number of live births during the year. The infant mortality rate is also called the infant death rate. Infant mortality has significantly declined mainly due to improvements in basic health care, though high technology medical advances have also helped.
This epidemiological indicator is recognized as an important measure of the level of healthcare in a country because it is directly linked with the health status of infants, children, and pregnant women as well as access to medical care, socioeconomic conditions, and public health practices.
Feeding is done by breastfeeding or with special industrial milk, "infant formula". Babies have a sucking instinct allowing them to extract the milk from the nipples of the breasts or of the nipple of the baby bottle.
Breastfeeding provides babies with many natural immune substances and isolates the baby from most bacteria or other contaminations in the local water supply. Infant formula does not provide these immune substances and in places with poor quality water supply subjects the baby to disease which it would not be subjected to if breastfed. Public relations methods have been used to encourage the use of infant formula and increase profits for corporations which produce and sell the infant formula, despite negotiations between mothers' networks like Baby Milk Action, the World Health Organisation and corporations.
The annual worldwide death toll due to these public relations methods is estimated at about 1.5 million. [1]
Babies are incontinent, therefore diapers are used.
Babies can not walk, transport may be by perambulator (stroller) or on the back or in front in a special bag or cloth.
Unlike other people, babies often cry without apparent cause.
As is the case of most of other young children, the social presence of infants is different from that of adult individuals. They are usually treated as special persons. They may be the focus of attention. On the other hand, fees of transportation and entrance fees are often less or nothing, possibly with requirements about who guides them. One reason is that e.g. a baby is taken in an amusement park not to have fun, or in a museum not to watch the artwork, but because it can not be left at home.
The term infant is also used as formal term for minor, i.e. child in general.
External Links
- Infant mortality rates in different countries and other health indicators :
- Baby Milk Action - network opposing the killing of 1.5 million babies per year
- Baby pictures
- Baby poems
- Baby shower
- Free Baby shower games
- Baby shower favors
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Infant."
Synonyms: InfancySynonyms: babyhood (n), early childhood (n). (additional references) |
| Synonym by domain: babyhood (medicine). |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Beginning | Origin; (cause); source, rise; bud, germ; egg, rudiment; genesis, primogenesis, birth, nativity, cradle, infancy; start, inception, creation, starting point; dawn; (morning); evolution. |
Adverb: at the beginning, in the beginning; Noun: first, in the first place, imprimis, first and foremost; in limine; in the bud, in embryo, in its infancy; from the beginning, from its birth; ab initio, ab ovo, ab incunabilis, ab origine. | |
Youth | Noun: youth; juvenility, juvenescence; juniority; infancy; babyhood, childhood, boyhood, girlhood, youthhood; incunabula; minority, nonage, teens, tender age, bloom. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Infancy |
| English words defined with "infancy": -ancy ♦ changeling, childhood, cradle ♦ gender identity ♦ Infanthood, infantile ♦ presentably, puerility ♦ Red-gum ♦ To be in leading strings. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "infancy": Bees ♦ Caleb, Candidiasis, Chronic Mucocutaneous, Childhood, Chondrodysplasia Punctata ♦ Delias ♦ Elimination Disorders, Epidermolysis Bullosa Dystrophica ♦ Feeding and Eating Disorders of Childhood, FLY ♦ GORDON, Guiderius ♦ HOG-CONFINEMENT-SYSTEM MANAGER, Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome ♦ LAP ♦ Mental Disorders Diagnosed in Childhood, metopic suture ♦ Nicean Barks ♦ Porphyria, Erythropoietic, Pseudohypoaldosteronism ♦ Universal Character Set ♦ Williams Syndrome ♦ Yesterday. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Clever | Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery? (references; author: unknown) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
Books |
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Theater & Movies | |||
Music |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit |  | Joan of Arc in infancy. Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| Author | Quotation |
Baron de Montesquieu | In the infancy of societies, the chiefs of the state shape its institutions; later the institutions shape the chiefs of state. |
Colton | Antiquity is enjoyed not by the ancients who lived in the infancy of things, but by us who live in their maturity. |
Henry Bolingbroke | Nations, like men, have their infancy. |
Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt | Character building begins in our infancy and continues until death. |
Ralph Waldo Emerson | Infancy conforms to nobody: all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the adults who prattle and play to it. |
Schlegal | Authorship, according to the spirit in which it is pursued, is an infancy a pastime, a labor, a handicraft, an art, a science, or a virtue. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | |
| Author | Date | Quotation |
John Locke | 1690 | It was no wonder that they should pitch upon, and naturally run into that form of government, which from their infancy they had been all accustomed to; and which, by experience, they had found both easy and safe. (Second Treatise of Government) |
Communist Manifesto | 1848 | But the proletariat, as yet in its infancy, offers to them the spectacle of a class without any historical initiative or any independent political movement. (reference) |
Winston S. Churchill | 1946 | Except in the British Commonwealth and in the United States where Communism is in its infancy, the Communist parties or fifth columns constitute a growing challenge and peril to Christian civilization. ("Iron Curtain" Speech) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Title | Author | Quote |
Emma | Austen, Jane | She will be disagreeable in infancy, and correct herself as she grows older |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | Never, since his infancy, since his mother, since his sister, never had he been greeted with a friendly word or a kind regard |
Walden | Thoreau, Henry David | We may imagine a time when, in the infancy of the human race, some enterprising mortal crept into a hollow in a rock for shelter |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | Patients with type A die in infancy. (references) | |
LAD typically manifests itself in infancy. (references) | ||
Several types of epilepsy begin in infancy. (references) | ||
Business | The new car market is still in its infancy. (references) | |
Future wireless competitive access to the infrastructure is still in its infancy. (references) | ||
Although in its infancy, the computer industry in general is the fastest growing economic sector in Kenya. (references) | ||
Children | Slovak Republic | It has resulted in an increased number of abandoned Roma children either at the hospital immediately after birth or during infancy. (references) |
Senegal | The Ministry of Family and Infancy, formerly the Ministry of Family, Social Action, and National Solidarity, established in 1990, is responsible for promoting children's welfare. (references) | |
Economic History | Belgium | Renewable energy is in its infancy in Belgium. (references) |
Trade | Guyana | Labeling, marking, and other consumer protection requirements are in their infancy in Guyana. (references) |
Kenya | Despite the existence of a relatively developed and sophisticated financial system, Kenya's capital market is still in its infancy. (references) | |
Kenya | The exchange is fully computerized and is currently in the process of installing electronic central depository system (CDS). However, the NSE is still in its infancy. (references) | |
Women | Benin | FGM is practiced on females ranging from infancy through 30 years of age and generally takes the form of excision. (references) |
Worker Rights | Cambodia | Only a small fraction (estimated at less than 1 percent) of the labor force is unionized, and the trade union movement, still in its infancy, is very weak. (references) |
Macedonia | The Constitution implicitly recognizes employees' right to bargain collectively; however, implementing legislation in this area had not been passed, and the concept of collective bargaining remained in its infancy. (references) | |
Lexicography | Devil's Dictionary | FLY-:SPECK:, n. The prototype of punctuation. It is observed by Garvinus that the systems of punctuation in use by the various literary nations depended originally upon the social habits and general diet of the flies infesting the several countries. These creatures, which have always been distinguished for a neighborly and companionable familiarity with authors, liberally or niggardly embellish the manuscripts in process of growth under the pen, according to their bodily habit, bringing out the sense of the work by a species of interpretation superior to, and independent of, the writer's powers. The "old masters" of literature -- that is to say, the early writers whose work is so esteemed by later scribes and critics in the same language -- never punctuated at all, but worked right along free-handed, without that abruption of the thought which comes from the use of points. (We observe the same thing in children to-day, whose usage in this particular is a striking and beautiful instance of the law that the infancy of individuals reproduces the methods and stages of development characterizing the infancy of races.) In the work of these primitive scribes all the punctuation is found, by the modern investigator with his optical instruments and chemical tests, to have been inserted by the writers' ingenious and serviceable collaborator, the common house-fly -- Musca maledicta. In transcribing these ancient MSS, for the purpose of either making the work their own or preserving what they naturally regard as divine revelations, later writers reverently and accurately copy whatever marks they find upon the papyrus or parchment, to the unspeakable enhancement of the lucidity of the thought and value of the work. Writers contemporary with the copyists naturally avail themselves of the obvious advantages of these marks in their own work, and with such assistance as the flies of their own household may be willing to grant, frequently rival and sometimes surpass the older compositions, in respect at least of punctuation, which is no small glory. Fully to understand the important services that flies perform to literature it is only necessary to lay a page of some popular novelist alongside a saucer of cream-and-molasses in a sunny room and observe "how the wit brightens and the style refines" in accurate proportion to the duration of exposure. |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| Speaker | Term | Phrase(s) |
James Madison | 1809-1817 | How far it may be expedient to guard the infancy of this improvement in the distribution of labor by regulations of the commercial tariff is a subject which can not fail to suggest itself to your patriotic reflections. |
John Quincy Adams | 1825-1829 | The constitution of the judiciary, experimental and imperfect as it was even in the infancy of our existing Government, is yet more inadequate to the administration of national justice at our present maturity. |
Andrew Jackson | 1829-1837 | With the nation that was our earliest friend and ally in the infancy of our political existence the most friendly relations have subsisted through the late revolutions of its Government, and, from the events of the last, promise a permanent duration. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| "Infancy" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 100.00% of the time. "Infancy" is used about 429 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 100% | 429 | 13,364 |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "infancy": be still in its infancy ♦ from his infancy ♦ in infancy ♦ in its infancy ♦ in one's infancy ♦ it is in its infancy. Additional references. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
infancy | 47 |
development infancy | 6 |
infancy stage | 5 |
chart growth head infancy | 4 |
au cafe in infancy lait spot | 4 |
hypogammaglobulinemia infancy transient | 3 |
depth in infancy perception | 2 |
gospel infancy thomas | 2 |
the infancy narrative | 2 |
child development infancy period stage | 2 |
education infancy | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "infancy"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | moshë e mitur, hapat e parë, foshnjëri (babyhood), fillimet (principles). (various references) | |
Arabic | سن القصور (minority, nonage), طفولة (babyhood, child's play, girlhood), القصور (incapability, insufficiency), بداء ة. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | ранно детство, непълнолетие (minority, nonage, pupilage), начало (abc, basis, beginning, dawn, debut, forepart, genesis, inception, incipience, initiation, kick off, lead off, offset, onset, opening, origin, origination, outset, prime, principle, proem, rise, rudiment, set out, source, start), най-ранен стадий (prime), най-ранен период, малолетие. (various references) | |
Chinese | 嬰'期 , 初期 (Germinal). (various references) | |
Czech | rané dìtství, neplnoletost. (various references) | |
Danish | spaedbarnsalder (babyhood). (various references) | |
Dutch | minderjarigheid (minority). (various references) | |
Finnish | lapsuus (childhood), alaikäisyys (minority). (various references) | |
French | minorité. (various references) | |
German | kindheit (babyhood, boyhood, childhood), kindesalter (childhood), minderjährigkeit (minority, nonage). (various references) | |
Greek | νηπιακή ηλικία (baby hood). (various references) | |
Hebrew | יל"ות (childhood, childishness), י קות (babyhood, childhood), 'יל "רך. (various references) | |
Hungarian | kiskorúság (minority, nonage, pupilage), kisgyermekkor (babyhood), kezdeti szakasza vminek, gyermekkor (boyhood, childhood, early life), csecsemõkor (babyhood), csecsemőkor (babyhood, early age). (various references) | |
Italian | infanzia (babyhood, childhood), prima infanzia (babyhood), minorit (minority, nonage), et minore (minority, nonage). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 幼稚 (childish, infantile). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | ようしょう (childhood, claim, important point, key point, strategic position, tender age), ようね" (childhood), ようら"き (in cradle), ようじき, ようち (beautiful pond, childish, important place, infantile, night attack, place where immortals live, site, strategic location). (various references) | |
Korean | 년기 (Childhood). (various references) | |
Manx | oikanys (babyhood), lhiannooaght (babyhood, boyishness, puerility), lambaanys (childhood, dotage, pusillanimity), lambaanid (childhood, dotage, pusillanimity). (various references) | |
Norwegian | barndom (childhood). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | infancyay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | infncia, primeira infncia, minoridade, menoridade (minority, nonage, pupilage, wardship), meninice (babyhood, childhood). (various references) | |
Romanian | vârstã fragedã, minorat (minority, nonage), fazã embrionatã, copilãrie (babyhood, boyhood, childhood, childishness, girlhood). (various references) | |
Russian | раннее детство, ранний детство, несовершеннолетие (minority, nonage), детство (boyhood, childhood, child-hood), детский возраст (childhood). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | rano detinjstvo, nepunoletnost. (various references) | |
Spanish | infancia (babyhood, childhood, juvenile, year). (various references) | |
Swedish | barndom (babyhood, boyhood, childhood, youth). (various references) | |
Thai | วัยทารก. (various references) | |
Turkish | bebeklik, başlangıç (approach, beginning, big bang, commencement, commencing, cradle, dawn, departure, doorway, early, elementary, exordium, first, go off, inception, incipience, incipiency, incunabula, introduction, lead off, morning, off, onset, origin, outset, preamble, preliminary, prelude, prime, proem, prolog, prologue, push off, setout, start, starting, take off, toe-hold), çocukluk (childhood, childness, juvenility, puerility). (various references) | |
Ukrainian | період становлення, дитячі роки. (various references) | |
Vietnamese | tuổi còn ãm ngửa. (various references) | |
Welsh | plentyndod (childhood), mebyd (boyhood, childhood, youth), maboed (childhood, youth), mabandod (childhood), babandod (babyhood, beginning). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | infantia, infantiae, infantiam, parvuli, parvulis, parvulo, parvulorum, parvulos, parvulum, parvulus. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Misspellings | |
"Infancy" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: inany, infan, infanty, infany, Infean, unfancy. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "infancy" (pronounced i"nfunsē) |
| 4 | -u n s ē | absorbency, accountancy, agency, ascendancy, ascendency, buoyancy, clemency, cogency, competency, complacency, Conservancy, consistency, constancy, constituency, consultancy, contingency, counterinsurgency, currency, decency, deficiency, delinquency, dependency, despondency, discrepancy, latency, dormancy, efficiency, emergency, equivalency, excellency, exigency, expectancy, expediency, fluency, frequency, hesitancy, immunodeficiency, incompetency, inconsistency, inconstancy, incumbency, indecency, inefficiency, infrequency, insolvency, insurgency, interagency, irrelevancy, leniency, malignancy, militancy, nonemergency, occupancy, poignancy, potency, pregnancy, presidency, proficiency, redundancy, regency, relevancy, residency, resiliency, solvency, stridency, stringency, sufficiency, tenancy, tendency, transparency, truancy, urgency, vacancy, vagrancy, vibrancy. |
| 3 | -n s ē | bouncy, chancy, deviancy, fancy, fiancee, mincy, Nancy, necromancy, teensy. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-c-f-i-n-n-y" | |
-1 letter: cyanin. | |
-2 letters: canny, fancy, fanny, finny, nancy. | |
-3 letters: ayin, cain, cyan, fain, naif. | |
-4 letters: ain, ani, any, can, cay, fan, fay, fin, icy, inn, nan, nay, yin. | |
-5 letters: ai, an, ay, fa, if, in, na, ya. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-c-f-i-n-n-y" | |
+1 letter: fancying. | |
+3 letters: carnifying, fancifying. | |
+4 letters: financially, functionary, sanctifying. | |
+5 letters: functionally, significancy. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Images: Photo Album 8. Quotations: Familiar | 9. Quotations: Historic 10. Quotations: Fiction 11. Quotations: Non-fiction 12. Quotations: Speeches | 13. Usage Frequency 14. Expressions 15. Expressions: Internet 16. Translations: Modern | 17. Translations: Ancient 18. Derivations 19. Rhymes 20. Anagrams | 21. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
