respectability

English

Etymology

respect +‎ -ability

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɹɪˌspɛktəˈbɪlɪti/

Noun

respectability (usually uncountable, plural respectabilities)

1. The quality of being respectable.
   • 1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:

     Such a scandal as the prosecution of a brother for forgery—with a verdict of guilty—is a most truly horrible, deplorable, fatal thing. It takes the respectability out of a family perhaps at a critical moment, when the family is just assuming the robes of respectability: […] it is a black spot which all the soaps ever advertised could never wash off.

   • 2012 June 19, Phil McNulty, “England 1-0 Ukraine”, in BBC Sport:

     But once again Hodgson's men found a way to get the result they required and there is a real air of respectability about their campaign even though they had to survive a first-half siege from a Ukraine side desperate for the win they needed to progress.

2. The class of respectable people.

Derived terms

• respectability politics

Translations

quality of being respectable

• Bulgarian: почтеност (bg) f (počtenost), порядъчност (bg) f (porjadǎčnost)
• Danish: respektabelhed c
• Finnish: kunnioitettavuus (fi)
• French: respectabilité (fr) f
• Ido: respektindeso (io)
• Italian: rispettabilità (it) f, perbenismo (it) m
• Portuguese: respeitabilidade f
• Romanian: respectabilitate (ro) f
• Spanish: respetabilidad (es) f
• Swedish: respektabilitet c