Dictionary

domesticity en · NOUN

Etymology

Etymology tree English domestic Proto-Indo-European *-teh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-ts Proto-Indo-European *-teh₂ts Latin -itāsder. Old French -itebor. Middle English -ite English -ity English domesticity From domestic + -ity.

Meanings

1. (countable, uncountable) Life at home; homelife.
   • The Neolithic of 8000 to 6000 B.C. is in the sign of Cancer, a feminine sign associated with domesticity, retentiveness, and sentiment. 1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 131:
2. (countable, in-plural, uncountable) Domestic chores; housework.
   • Besides the jar of contrast there came to her a chill self-reproach that she had not returned sooner, to help her mother in these domesticities, instead of indulging herself out-of-doors. 1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, volume 1, London: James R. Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., page 29:
3. (countable, uncountable) Affection for the home and its comforts.
   • As we have seen, Browning renovates her life-after-divorce by framing her domesticity in increasingly autoerotic terms. With her sensuous boudoir, lust for furniture, love affair with houses, and espousal of baked goods, hers is an appetitive domesticity geared to self-pleasure. 2017, Susan Fraiman, Extreme Domesticity:
   • Duncan's lovelife may be divided between an earlier period of promiscuity and a later period of domesticity. 1988 February 21, Charley Shively, “Not Afraid To Be A Queen”, in Gay Community News, volume 15, number 31, page 3:

Forms

Antonyms

society · business · worldliness

Synonyms

materialism · comfort · family

Translations (5)

fi kotimaisuus (affection for the home) · pl domowe zacisze (affection for the home) · ca domesticitat (affection for the home) · es domesticidad (affection for the home) · fi perhe-elämä (affection for the home)