Dictionary

propinquity en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (Southern-England) audio
• /pɹəˈpɪŋ.kwɪ.ti/ (UK)

Etymology

From propinqu(ent) + -ity, from Middle English propinquite, from Middle French propinquité or Latin propinquitās, from propinquus (“neighbouring”) (from prop(e) (“near”) + (h)inc (“hence”) + -uus).

Meanings

1. (countable, literary, uncountable) Nearness or proximity
   • Surely, too, it would be a waste of an agent, for after several hours of propinquity I could scarcely fail to recognise him in the future. 1973, Kyril Bonfiglioli, Don't Point That Thing at Me, Penguin, published 2001, page 70:
   • Yet, never before in human history has it been so easy to communicate across long distances. Never before have men been able to maintain intimate and continuing contact with others across thousands of miles; never has intimacy been so independent of spatial propinquity. 1963, Melvin M. Webber, “Order in Diversity: Community without Propinquity”, in Lowdon Wingo Jr., editor, Cities and Space: The Future Use of Urban Land, page 43:
   • A seventy-second section of the film, spelling out the concept of time and propinquity, involves archival footage of (and this is an incomplete list) American cars going through an underpass; flaring streetlights; two men in loud suits, their faces out of the frame, smoking cigars and drinking whisky while sitting on garden furniture on the balcony of a high rise; […] 2021 January 28, Sam Knight, “Adam Curtis Explains It All”, in The New Yorker:
   • There was also the question of Julius’s glandular responses to the almost daily propinquity of his Empress, so naked under her lawn. 1985, Anthony Burgess, The Kingdom of the Wicked:
   • Geographical propinquity gives rise to conflicting territorial claims from Bosnia to Mindanao. 1993, Samuel P. Huntington, “The Clash of Civilizations?”, in Foreign Affairs:
   • Some experimental spirits could not resist the diversion of throwing Varick and his former wife together, and there were those who thought he found a zest in the propinquity. 1904, Edith Wharton, The Other Two:
2. (countable, literary, uncountable) Affiliation or similarity.
   • What is impossible is not the propinquity of the things listed, but the very site on which their propinquity would be possible. 1970, Michel Foucault, The Order of Things, Routledge, translation of Les mots et les choses, published 2002, page xviii:
   • Propinquity and corruption don't always go side by side. 2012, Andrew Marr (heard at the Leveson inquiry.)
   • [A] person's mere propinquity to others independently suspected of criminal activity does not, without more, give rise to probable cause to search that person. 1979, Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U.S. 85, 86 (1979)
   • Decent people out there. Russ wants to believe they are still assembled in some recognizable manner, the kindred unit at the radio, old lines and ties and propinquities. 1997, Don DeLillo, Underworld:
   • Heere I diſclaime all my Paternall care, / Propinquity and property of blood, / And as a ſtranger to my heart and me, / Hold thee from this for euer. c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i], page 284, lines 112–115:

Forms

Relateds

mere exposure effect · propinquitous

Synonyms

appropinquity

Translations (6)

es projimidad (affiliation or similarity) · ru родство́ (affiliation or similarity) · es propincuidad (affiliation or similarity) · fa شباهت (affiliation or similarity) · bg сходство (affiliation or similarity) · enm propinquite (affiliation or similarity)