• soc.(abbreviation)

Borrowed fromMiddle Frenchsocieté, fromOld Frenchsocieté, fromLatinsocietās, societātem(“fellowship, association, alliance, union, community”), fromsocius(“associated, allied; partner, companion, ally”), fromProto-Indo-European*sokʷ-yo-(“companion”), fromProto-Indo-European*sekʷ-(“to follow”). First attested in the 1530s.^[1]

• IPA^(key):/səˈsaɪ.ə.ti/

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society (countable anduncountable,pluralsocieties)

1. (countable) Along-standing group of people sharingcultural aspects such as language, dress, norms of behavior and artistic forms.

   Thissociety has been known for centuries for its colorful clothing and tight-knit family structure.

   • 2012 March-April, John T. Jost, “Social Justice: Is It in Our Nature (and Our Future)?”, inAmerican Scientist, volume100, number 2, page162:

     He draws eclectically on studies of baboons, descriptive anthropological accounts of hunter-gatherersocieties and, in a few cases, the fossil record.

2. (countable) A group of people who meet from time to time to engage in a commoninterest; anassociation ororganization.

   It was then that they decided to found asociety of didgeridoo-playing unicyclists.

   • 1892,Walter Besant, chapter III, inThe Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.:Harper & Brothers, […],→OCLC:

     At half-past nine on this Saturday evening, the parlour of the Salutation Inn, High Holborn, contained most of its customary visitors.[…]In former days every tavern of repute kept such a room for its own select circle, a club, orsociety, of habitués, who met every evening, for a pipe and a cheerful glass.

3. (countable) The sum total of allvoluntaryinterrelations between individuals.

   The gap between Western and Easternsocieties seems to be narrowing.

   • 2013 August 10, Schumpeter, “Cronies and capitols”, inThe Economist, volume408, number8848:

     Policing the relationship between government and business in a freesociety is difficult. Businesspeople have every right to lobby governments, and civil servants to take jobs in the private sector.

4. (uncountable) The people of one’s country or community taken as a whole.

   Our globalsociety develops in fits and starts.

   • 2006,Edwin Black, chapter 1, inInternal Combustion:

     If successful, Edison and Ford—in 1914—would movesociety away from the ever more expensive and then universally known killing hazards of gasoline cars: […].

   • 2012 January, Steven Sloman, “The Battle Between Intuition and Deliberation”, inAmerican Scientist, volume100, number 1, page74:

     Libertarian paternalism is the view that, because the way options are presented to citizens affects what they choose,society should present options in a way that “nudges” our intuitive selves to make choices that are more consistent with what our more deliberative selves would have chosen if they were in control.

5. (uncountable)High society.

   Smith was first introduced intosociety at the Duchess of Grand Fenwick's annual rose garden party.

   • 1813,Jane Austen,Pride and Prejudice:

     "What a charming amusement for young people this is, Mr. Darcy! There is nothing like dancing after all. I consider it as one of the first refinements of polishedsociety."

6. (countable,law) A number of people joined bymutualconsent todeliberate, determine and act toward a commongoal.

• "society" in Raymond Williams,Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 291.