Obscenity
noun ·4 syllables ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 Something that is obscene. countable
"Martha wouldn't go into the art museum because, as she put it, "They have obscenities just sitting out, on display!""
- 2 an obscene act wordnet
- 3 An act of obscene behaviour. countable
"Bestiality was outlawed as an obscenity in the strongly conservative community."
- 4 the trait of behaving in an obscene manner wordnet
- 5 Specifically, an offensive word; a profanity; a dirty word. countable
"Eliza couldn't stand her daughter's music; as she saw it, it was just shouted obscenities and a heavy drum beat."
Show 3 more definitions
- 6 an offensive or indecent word or phrase wordnet
- 7 Lewdness, indecency, or offensive behaviour or material. uncountable
"The coalition of religious conservatives was campaigning against, in their view, rampant obscenity in the entertainment industry."
- 8 The fact of being obscene. uncountable
"Henia Flint Goodman, a Holocaust survivor,spoke in outrage against the obscenity of anti-abortion literature which compares a woman's free choice to have an abortion with the crimes of the Nazi state."
Example
More examples"Obscenity is whatever happens to shock some elderly and ignorant magistrate."
Etymology
From obscene + -ity, from Latin obscenitas.
Related phrases
More for "obscenity"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.