novum

See also: Novum

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin novum.

Noun

novum (countable and uncountable, plural novums or nova)

1. A new feature, a novelty.
   • 1959, Erik Zürcher, The Buddhist conquest of China, volume 1, page 266:

     we find among the cultured devotees a tendency to idealize a foreign civilisation — a novum in Chinese history.

2. (narratology, science fiction) An innovation which is fictional, but, following the logic of cognitive estrangement (characteristic of science fiction), is afforded plausibility by the assumption that the fictional setting is scientifically consistent.
   • 2003, Istvan Csicsery-Ronay, Jr., “7: Marxist theory and science fiction”, in Edward James, Farah Mendlesohn, editors, The Cambridge Companion to Science Fiction, Cambridge University Press, page 118:

     In his book Metamorphoses of Science Fiction (1979), Suvin introduced a number of ideas that remain central in sf criticism: cognitive estrangement, the novum and sf's genetic link with utopia. […] Even more influential in sf theory than cognitive estrangement is Suvin's concept of the novum. […] Suvin adopts the concept of the novum from the work of Ernst Bloch, for whom the term refers to those concrete innovations of lived history that awaken human collective consciousness out of a static present to awareness that history can be changed. The novum thus inspires hope for positive historical transformations.

   • 2006, Adam Roberts, Science Fiction‎^[1], Taylor & Francis (Routledge), pages 6–7:

     It seems that this ‘point of difference’, the thing or things that differentiate the world portrayed in science fiction from the world we recognise around us, is the crucial separator between SF and other forms of imaginative or fantastic literature. The critic Darko Suvin has usefully coined the term ‘novum’, the Latin for ‘new’ or ‘new thing’, to refer to this ‘point of difference’ (the plural is ‘nova’). An SF text may be based on one novum, such as [...]. More usually it will be predicated on a number of interrelated nova, such as [...]. This ‘novum’ must not be supernatural but need not necessarily be a piece of technology.

3. (obsolete, uncountable) A game of dice, properly called novem quinque, the two principal throws being nine and five.
   • c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii], lines 540–541:

     Abate throw at novum, and the whole world again
     Cannot pick out five such, take each one in his vein.

Quotations

For more quotations using this term, see Citations:novum.

Related terms

• nova

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin novum.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈnoː.vʏm/

• Audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: no‧vum
• Rhymes: -oːvʏm

Noun

novum n (plural nova or novums)

1. A novelty, a novum.

Descendants

• → Indonesian: novum

Indonesian

Etymology

From Dutch novum, from Latin novum.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ˈnovʊm]
• Hyphenation: no‧vum

Noun

novum (first-person possessive novumku, second-person possessive novummu, third-person possessive novumnya)

1. A novelty, a novum.
2. (law) new evidence for appeal.

Further reading

• “novum” in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia, Jakarta: Agency for Language Development and Cultivation — Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of the Republic Indonesia, 2016.

Latin

Adjective

novum

1. inflection of novus:
   1. neuter nominative/accusative/vocative singular
   2. masculine accusative singular

Descendants

• English: nomen novum

References

• novum in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)

Polish

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from Latin novum. Doublet of neon and nowy.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈnɔ.vum/

• Audio

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔvum
• Syllabification: no‧vum

Noun

novum n (indeclinable)

1. novelty, novum

   Synonym: nowość

Further reading

• novum in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• novum in Polish dictionaries at PWN