incivility

English

Etymology

From Middle French incivilité, from Late Latin incivilitas (“incivility”), from Latin incivilis (“impolite, uncivil”), from in- (privative prefix) + civilis (“belonging to a citizen, civic, political, urbane, courteous, civil”) (from civis (“a citizen”)).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪnsɪˈvɪlɪti/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• Hyphenation: in‧ci‧vil‧i‧ty

Noun

incivility (countable and uncountable, plural incivilities)

1. (uncountable) The state of being uncivil; lack of courtesy; rudeness in manner.

   Synonym: impoliteness

   • c. 1594 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Comedie of Errors”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iv]:

     Courtezan. How say you now? is not your husband mad? / Adriana. His incivility confirms no less.

   • 1668, David Lloyd, Memoires of the Lives, Actions, Sufferings, and Deaths of those Noble, Reverend, and Excellent Personages that suffered by Death, Sequestration, Decimation, and otherwise for the Protestant Religion, London: Samuel Speed, “The Life and Death of Robert Berkley,” p. 96,^[1]

     Beat on proud Billows, Boreas blow,

     Swell curled Waves, high as Jove’s roof,

     Your incivility doth show,

     That Innocence is tempest proof.

   • 1811, [Jane Austen], chapter XXXI, in Sense and Sensibility […], volumes (please specify |volume=I to III), London: […] C[harles] Roworth, […], and published by T[homas] Egerton, […], →OCLC:

     Little did Mr. Willoughby imagine, I suppose, when his looks censured me for incivility in breaking up the party, that I was called away to the relief of one whom he had made poor and miserable […]

   • 1927 May, Virginia Woolf, chapter 1, in To the Lighthouse (Uniform Edition of the Works of Virginia Woolf), new edition, London: Leonard and Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, […], published 1930, →OCLC:

     [S]he could not bear incivility to her guests, to young men in particular […]

2. (countable) Any act of rudeness or ill-breeding.
   • 1626, Ovid, “(please specify the page)”, in George Sandys, transl., Ovid’s Metamorphosis Englished […], London: […] William Stansby, →OCLC:

     Latona, in her flight from Juno, is churlishly intreated by the Lycian pesants, and denied the publique benefit of water: for which incivility these bawling Clownes are changed into croaking froggs, and confined unto that Lake for ever.

   • a. 1639 (date written), Henry Wotton, “[Letters, &c. and Characters of Sundry Personages, […].] My Deare Nic. Pey.”, in Reliquiæ Wottonianæ. Or, A Collection of Lives, Letters, Poems; […], London: […] Thomas Maxey, for R[ichard] Marriot, G[abriel] Bedel, and T[imothy] Garthwait, published 1651, →OCLC, page 507:

     In truth, vve thought it (coming immediately from an infected place) an hazardous incivilitie, to put our ſelves upon them; for if any ſiniſter accident had fallen out about the ſame time (for Coincidents are not alvvaies Cauſes) vve ſhould have rued it for ever.

   • 1748, [Samuel Richardson], “Letter IV”, in Clarissa. Or, The History of a Young Lady: […], volume I, London: […] S[amuel] Richardson;  […], →OCLC, page 26:

     Mr. Lovelace, for three days together, sent twice each day to inquire after my brother’s health; and, altho’ he received rude, and even shocking returns, he thought fit, on the fourth day, to make in person the fame inquiries; and received still greater incivilities from my two uncles, who happen’d to be both there.

   • 1889, Sabine Baring-Gould, “A Face in the Dark” in Pennycomequicks, London: Spencer, Blackett & Hallam, Volume II, p. 54:^[2]

     When my poor Sidebottom was alive, if there had been any unpleasantness between us during the day [...] I have shaken him at night to wake him up, that he might receive my pardon for an incivility said or done.

3. (uncountable) Lack of civilization; a state of rudeness or barbarism.
   • 1781, [Mostyn John Armstrong], History and Antiquities of the County of Norfolk. Volume IX. Containing the Hundreds of Smithdon, Taverham, Tunstead, Walsham, and Wayland, volume IX, Norwich: Printed by J. Crouse, for M. Booth, bookseller, →OCLC, page 51:

     BEAT on, proud billows; Boreas blow; / Swell, curled waves, high as Jove's roof; / Your incivility doth ſhow, / That innocence is tempeſt proof; / Though ſurly Nereus frown, my thoughts are calm; / Then ſtrike, Affliction, for thy wounds are balm. [Attributed to Roger L'Estrange (1616–1704).]

Related terms

• incivil

Translations

state of being uncivil; lack of courtesy; rudeness in manner

• Bulgarian: грубост (bg) f (grubost), неучтивост (bg) f (neučtivost)
• Catalan: incivilitat f
• Finnish: epäkohteliaisuus (fi)
• German: unhöfliches Benehmen n, Unhöflichkeit (de) f, Grobheit (de) f
• Spanish: incivilidad (es) f

See also

• discourtesy
• disrespect
• impoliteness
• rudeness
• uncourteousness
• unmannerliness

References

• “incivility”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “incivility”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.