enlightenment
noun
Simple meaning
A concept in spirituality, philosophy and psychology related to achieving clarity of perception, reason and knowledge.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
ehnlytuhnmuhntSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ɛnˈlaɪtənmənt
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
A concept in spirituality, philosophy and psychology related to achieving clarity of perception, reason and knowledge.
An act of enlightening, or the state of being enlightened or instructed.
history
A 17th- and 18th-century European intellectual movement emphasizing rationalism. The period during which it flourished is called the Age of Enlightenment or Age of Reason.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Formality
- Technical
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A concept in spirituality, philosophy and psychology related to achieving clarity of perception, reason and knowledge.
Used this way, enlightenment is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly warm, approving pull. It turns up most in academic writing contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Positive
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Gentle
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Clear and precise
- Usage feel
- Precise and approving
Where it naturally appears
- Academic writing
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use enlightenment
- “The Enlightenment brought about many humanitarian reforms.”noun
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.