slavery
noun · adjective
Simple meaning
An institution or social practice of owning human beings as property.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
slayvereeSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈsleɪvɚi
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
The practice of owning slaves
An institution or social practice of owning human beings as property, especially for use as forced laborers.
Forced labor in general, regardless of legality.
A condition of servitude endured by a slave.
figuratively
A condition in which one is captivated or subjugated, as by greed or drugs.
adjective
Covered in slaver; slobbery.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B1 · Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- General and technical use
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The practice of owning slaves
Used this way, slavery is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use slavery
- “The museum exhibit showed the terrible history of slavery around the world.”
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: practice of owning slaves
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Words can change meaning depending on context.
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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.