Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Familiarity |
FamiliarityNoun1. Personal knowledge or information about someone or something. 2. Usualness by virtue of being familiar or well known. 3. Close or warm friendship; "the absence of fences created a mysterious intimacy in which no one knew privacy". 4. A casual manner. 5. An act of undue intimacy. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "familiarity" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1258. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Biology & Biotechnology | The fact that most genetically engineered organisms are developed from organisms such as crop plants whose biology is well understood. Source: European Union. (references) |
Literature | Familiarity Too much familiarity breeds contempt. Latin: Nimia familiaritas contemptum parit. French: La familiaritéengendre le méris. Italian: La famigliarit f dispregiamento. "E tribus optimis rebus tres pessimæ oriuntur: E veritate odium; e familiaritate contemptus; E felicitate invidia." - Plutarch (translated). Source: Brewer's Dictionary. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Synonyms: FamiliaritySynonyms: acquaintance (n), casualness (n), closeness (n), conversance (n), conversancy (n), impropriety (n), indecorum (n), intimacy (n), liberty (n). (additional references) |
| Synonym by domain: familiarities (biology & biotechnology). |
| Antonym: unfamiliarity (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Friendship | Acquaintance, familiarity, intimacy, intercourse, fellowship, knowledge of; introduction. |
Knowledge | Noun: knowledge; cognizance, cognition, cognoscence; acquaintance, experience, ken, privity, insight, familiarity; comprehension, apprehension; recognition; appreciation; (judgment); intuition; conscience, consciousness; perception, precognition; acroamatics. |
Normality | Noun: normality, normalcy, normalness; familiarity, naturalness; commonness (frequency); rule, standard (conformity); customary (habit); standard, pattern (prototype). |
Sociality | Welcome, welcomeness; greeting; hearty welcome, hearty reception, warm reception; urbanity; (courtesy); familiarity. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Familiarity |
| English words defined with "familiarity": camaraderie, chumminess, cold, comradeliness, comradery, comradeship ♦ Disacquaintance ♦ Familiarities, Familiarness ♦ proficiency ♦ sexual intercourse, Shoulder clapper, shrinking violet, shy person ♦ technique, To keep one's distance, To take acquaintance of. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "familiarity": Arms of England, ARTIST AND REPERTOIRE MANAGER ♦ Bower-woman ♦ COMMISSIONER, CONSERVATION OF RESOURCES ♦ DYE AUTOMATION OPERATOR ♦ FLY ♦ INTELLIGENCE SPECIALIST, ISAAC ♦ MANAGER, FOOD CONCESSION, MANAGER, MARINE SERVICE, manager, public utility, rural ♦ OLD ONE, O'tium cum Dig ♦ PATENT AGENT, plant with novel traits ♦ SHOP ESTIMATOR, SUPERINTENDENT, ELECTRIC POWER, Sylphs. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "familiarity": Privity. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | I do detect a sense of familiarity and disappointment (Buffy the Vampire Slayer; writing credit: Doreen Spicer) | |
Clever | Familiarity breeds contempt; and children. (references; author: Mark Twain) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title |
Books |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit |  | War production drive. This chart was displayed in a Westinghouse plant in New Jersey as part of the war production drive. The labor-management committee reported that the easy familiarity of the wording on the thermometer was very effective--it helped pro. Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
| Author | Quotation |
Antoine Rivarol | Familiarity is the root of the closest friendships, as well as the interests hatreds. |
Ouida | Familiarity is a magician that is cruel to beauty but kind to ugliness. |
Publilius Syrus | Familiarity breeds contempt. |
William Hazlitt | Though familiarity may not breed contempt, it takes off the edge of admiration. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
Scarlet Letter | Hawthorne, Nathaniel | Its cool stare of familiarity was intolerable |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | He felt a desire to use the brusque familiarity common enough with doctors and priests, but which was not customary with him. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | In addition, familiarity with the challenges faced by housing and social service professionals working in these settings is desirable. (references) | |
The term "anabolic steroids" will be used through-out this report because of its familiarity, although the proper term for these compounds is "anabolic-androgenic" steroids. (references) | ||
As a group, individuals with a family history have relatively high frequencies of mutations in the CFTR gene. Members of this group have increased awareness of their risk of being carriers, as well as increased familiarity with the disease and its impact on the family. (references) | ||
Business | A lack of knowledge and familiarity with foreign applications has stifled industry exports. (references) | |
Most of the familiarity with US equipment is a result of its use in the South prior to the country's reunification. (references) | ||
The Chinese also prefer to do business with “old friends” and thus familiarity with the companies with which they do business. (references) | ||
Economic History | Chad | English-speaking lawyers are unavailable and most local lawyers have limited familiarity with U.S. commercial law. (references) |
Kenya | With many Kenyans educated in the U.S., there is a familiarity and affinity with U.S. manufactured scientific equipment. (references) | |
Trinidad | For reasons of proximity, language and familiarity, Trinidad and Tobago firms tend to look first to the United States for suppliers. (references) | |
Political Economy | RUSSIA | Because of the law's provisions and Russian companies' lack of familiarity with such measures, Russian companies have only been able to file successful actions in a handful of cases, mostly safeguards cases. (references) |
Bahamas | A common language, cultural similarities, family and personal ties dating back to the days of the American Revolution (when the ancestors of many modern Bahamians first came to the islands from the southeastern United States), and the enormous number of visitors every year between the two countries have engendered an unusually high level of familiarity and ease of communication. (references) | |
Travel | Egypt | Other variables are your familiarity with the city, the driver's demeanor and the taxi's physical attributes. (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. | ||
| "Familiarity" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 99.81% of the time. "Familiarity" is used about 514 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) | 99.81% | 513 | 11,826 |
| Noun (common) | 0.19% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Total | 100.00% | 514 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expression using "familiarity": familiarity with. Additional references. | |
| Hypenated Usage | |
Ending with "familiarity": over-familiarity. | |
| 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 |
familiarity breed contempt | 13 |
familiarity | 12 |
familiarity sin | 2 |
contempt familiarity god | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "familiarity"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Afrikaans | bekendheid (acquaintance, conversance, knowledge). (various references) | |
Albanian | sjellje e lirshme, shpengim (disengagement, redemption), intimitet (closeness, love making, privacy), afërsi (adjacency, closeness, contiguity, imminence, impendence, locality, nearness, neighborship, neighbourship, propinquity, proximity, vicinity). (various references) | |
Arabic | معرفة (acquaintance, awareness, cognition, cognizance, conversance, education, erudition, information, knowing, knowledge, learning, lore, scholarship), حميمية, حرية جنسية, عدم كلفة, صداقة (amity, friendliness, friendship), المام, إعتياد, ألفة (domesticity, intimacy). (various references) | |
Bulgarian | фамилиарност, знания (acquaintance, acquirements, attainments, information, knowledge, lore), знание (cognition, cognizance, information, knowing, knowledge, notion, privity, wisdom), запознатост, любовни отношения, близки отношения, интимност (informality, intimacy, intimity, inwardness, nearness, privacy). (various references) | |
Chinese | 熟悉 (Abreast, Acquaint, Acquainting, Familiar, familiarisation, familiarise, familiarised, familiarising, Familiarities, Familiarization, Familiarize, Familiarized, Familiarizing, knowingly). (various references) | |
Czech | všednost (platitude, triviality), obeznámenost (conversance), dùvìrnost (closeness, confidence, intimacy, privacy). (various references) | |
Danish | bekendtskab (acquaintance, conversance). (various references) | |
Dutch | bekendheid (acquaintance, conversance, knowledge). (various references) | |
Esperanto | konateco (acquaintance, conversance). (various references) | |
Finnish | tuttavallisuus (intimacy), tuntemus (knowledge). (various references) | |
French | familiarité. (various references) | |
German | vertrautheit (closeness, familiarness, intimacy, intimateness), vertraulichkeit (confidence, confidentiality), bekanntschaft (acquaintance, acquaintanceship, aquaintance, conversance, introduction, knowledge, pick up). (various references) | |
Greek | οικειότητα (habitude, intimacy, intimateness). (various references) | |
Hebrew | משפחתיות (intimacy), י"י"ות (affection, amity, fellowship, friendliness, friendship, neighborliness), קרב" (affinity, closeness, community, kinship, neighbourhood, propinquity, proximity, relation, vicinity), בקיאות (erudition, expertness, proficiency, skill, virtuosity). (various references) | |
Hungarian | bizalmasság (confidentiality, conversance, intimacy), meghittség (cosiness, coziness, intimacy), bizalmaskodás (confidentiality, familiarities). (various references) | |
Indonesian | keakraban (intimacy, solidarity). (various references) | |
Italian | familiarit , dimestichezza. (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 親近 (a relative), 親しみ (affection, intimacy), 昵懇 (intimacy). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | したしみ (affection, intimacy), し"き" (a relative, credit union, fungi, fungus, heart muscle, myocardium, protractor muscle), じっ"" (intimacy, putting one's heart and soul into). (various references) | |
Korean | 친밀 (Closeness, Familiarities, Intimacies, INTIMACY). (various references) | |
Manx | cumraagys (association, comradeship, intimacy), ainjys (acquaintance, intimacy). (various references) | |
Norwegian | fortrolighet (intimacy). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | amiliarityfay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | familiaridade (conversance, nearness). (various references) | |
Portuguese Brazilian | familiaridade. (various references) | |
Romanian | familiaritate (affability, conversance, freedom, knowledge, liberties, unceremoniousness), purtare neceremonioasã, intimitate (closeness, intimacy, intimity, privacy, secrets). (various references) | |
Russian | хорошая осведомленность, фамильярность, знакомство (acquaintance, acquaintances, acquaintanceship, knowledge), близкие отношения. (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | familijarnost, prisnost (intimacy, intimity, nearness, rapport). (various references) | |
Spanish | familiaridad (informality), notoriedad (acquaintance, conversance). (various references) | |
Swedish | förtrogenhet. (various references) | |
Thai | ความเชี่ยวชาญ (skill, sleight), ความคุ้นเคย. (various references) | |
Turkish | yatkınlık (aptness, bent, predisposition, proclivity), yakınlık (adjacency, affinity, approximation, closeness, connection, connexion, contiguity, immediacy, imminence, intimacy, kinship, nearness, propinquity, proximity, relationship, terms), samimiyet (bona fides, camaraderie, candor, candour, cordiality, earnestness, frankness, friendliness, heartiness, intimacy, outspokennes, sincereness, sincerity, terms, unaffectedness, warmth), laubalilik (freedom, unceremonious), iyi bilme, aşinalık. (various references) | |
Ukrainian | фамільярність, близькість (appetency, closeness, contiguity, nearness, neighborhood, neighborship, neighbourhood, neighbourship, nighness, propinquity, proximity), добра обізнаність. (various references) | |
Vietnamese | sự su"ng sã (flippancy), sự sỗ s ng (indecency), sự quen thuộc, sự lả lơi sự vuốt ve. (various references) | |
Welsh | cynefindra (use). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words ending with "familiarity": overfamiliarity, unfamiliarity. (additional references) | |
| |
"Familiarity" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: familiari, familuarity, faniliarity. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "familiarity" (pronounced fumi'lye"rutē) |
| 11 | f u m i' l y e" r u t ē | unfamiliarity. |
| 5 | -e" r u t ē | austerity, charity, clarity, dexterity, disparity, hilarity, insularity, irregularity, parity, peculiarity, polarity, popularity, posterity, prosperity, rarity, regularity, severity, similarity, sincerity, solidarity, temerity, unpopularity, Verity, vulgarity. |
| 4 | -r u t ē | alacrity, authority, barbarity, celebrity, dissimilarity, immaturity, impurity, inferiority, insecurity, integrity, majority, maturity, mediocrity, minority, obscurity, particularity, priority, purity, security, seniority, sorority, superiority, supermajority, surety. |
| 3 | -u t ē | absurdity, acceptability, accessibility, ability, abnormality, accountability, acidity, activity, actuality, acuity, adaptability, admissibility, adversity, advisability, affinity, affordability, aggressivity, agility, alkalinity, ambiguity, amenity, amiability, amity, analyticity, animosity, annuity, anonymity, antiquity, anxiety, applicability, atrocity, audacity, authenticity, availability, banality, believability, bestiality, biodiversity, bisexuality, brevity, brutality, calamity, capability, capacity, captivity, causality, cavity, centrality, chastity, civility, collegiality, commodity, commonality, community, comparability, compatibility, complexity, complicity, comprehensibility, conditionality, conductivity, confidentiality, conformity, congeniality, congruity, connectivity, constitutionality, continuity, convertibility, creativity, credibility, credulity, criminality, criticality, crotchety, culpability, curiosity, cyclicality, debility, deductibility, deformity, deity, deniability, density, dependability, depravity, deputy, desirability, dignity, dimensionality, disability, discontinuity, irresponsibility, irritability, laity, laxity, legality, disunity, diversity, divinity, docility, domesticity, duality, ductility, duplicity, durability, eccentricity, elasticity, electability, electricity, eligibility, enforceability, enmity, enormity, entity, equality, equanimity, equity, eternity, ethnicity, eventuality, exclusivity, expressivity, extraterritoriality, extremity, facility, fallibility, falsity, fatality, feasibility, Felicity, femininity, ferocity, fertility, festivity, fidelity, finality, flammability, flexibility, fluidity, formality, fragility, fraternity, frivolity, frugality, functionality, futility, generality, generosity, geniality, gentility, gratuity, gravity, gullibility, heredity, heterogeneity, heterosexuality, homogeneity, homosexuality, hospitality, hostility, humanity, humidity, humility, hyperactivity, hypersensitivity, identity, illegality, illiquidity, immobility, immorality, immortality, immunity, impartiality, impersonality, impossibility, impropriety, impunity, inability, inaccessibility, inactivity, incapacity, incivility, incompatibility, incongruity, incredulity, indemnity, indestructibility, indignity, individuality, inequality, inequity, inevitability, infallibility, infertility, infidelity, infinity, infirmity, inflexibility, informality, ingenuity, inhumanity, insanity, insensitivity, instability, instrumentality, intensity, invincibility, invisibility, invulnerability, irrationality, legibility, lethality, levity, liability, liberality, liquidity, lividity, locality, longevity, malleability, maneuverability, marketability, masculinity, materiality, maternity, mendacity, mentality, miscibility, mobility, modality, modernity, monstrosity, morality, morbidity, mortality, motility, multiplicity, municipality, musicality, mutuality, nationality, nativity, necessity, negativity, neutrality, nobility, Nonconformity, nonentity, nonutility, normality, notoriety, nudity, obesity, objectivity, obscenity, oddity, opacity, opportunity, originality, overcapacity, oversensitivity, palatability, partiality, passivity, paternity, paucity, permeability, perpetuity, perplexity, personality, perversity, piety, plausibility, plurality, polity, pomposity, portability, possibility, practicality, predictability, principality, probability, probity, proclivity, productivity, profanity, profitability, progressivity, promiscuity, propensity, proportionality, propriety, proximity, publicity, punctuality, quality, quantity, radioactivity, rapidity, rationality, reactivity, readability, reality, receptivity, reciprocity, reflexivity, relativity, reliability, religiosity, respectability, responsibility, retroactivity, rickety, rigidity, salinity, sanctity, sanity, scarcity, seasonality, selectivity, senility, sensibility, sensitivity, sensuality, sentimentality, serendipity, serenity, sexuality, simplicity, sobriety, society, solemnity, solidity, speciality, specificity, spirituality, spontaneity, stability, sterility, stupidity, subjectivity, suitability, superconductivity, superfluidity, survivability, susceptibility, sustainability, technicality, tenacity, theatricality, timidity, tonality, totality, toxicity, tranquility, transferability, Trinity, triviality, turbidity, ubiquity, unanimity, unavailability, uniformity, unity, universality, university, unpredictability, unreality, unreliability, uppity, utility, validity, vanity, variability, variety, varsity, velocity, velvety, venality, veracity, versatility, viability, vicinity, virginity, virility, virtuosity, viscosity, visibility, vitality, volatility, voracity, vulnerability. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-a-f-i-i-i-l-m-r-t-y" | |
-2 letters: militaria. | |
-3 letters: familiar, limitary, miliaria, military. | |
-4 letters: airlift, airmail, filaria, frailty, marital, martial, miliary, militia. | |
-5 letters: airily, amrita, artily, atrial, fairly, family, firmly, flirty, lariat, latria, maftir, mitral, ramify, ramtil, ratify, tamari, trimly. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-a-f-i-i-i-l-m-r-t-y" | |
+2 letters: unfamiliarity. | |
+4 letters: overfamiliarity. | |
| 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: Photo Album 7. Quotations: Familiar 8. Quotations: Fiction | 9. Quotations: Non-fiction 10. Usage Frequency 11. Expressions 12. Expressions: Internet | 13. Translations: Modern 14. Derivations 15. Rhymes 16. Anagrams | 17. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
