Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The disposition, character, or fundamental values peculiar to a specific person, people, culture, or movement: "They cultivated a subversive alternative ethos” ( Anthony Burgess).
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Habitual character and disposition.
- n. Specifically In the Gr. fine arts, etc., the inherent quality of a work which produces, or is fitted to produce, a high moral impression, noble, dignified, and universal, as opposed to a work characterized by pathos, or the particular, accidental, passionate, realistic quality.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. The character, sentiment, or disposition of a community or people, considered as a natural endowment; the spirit which actuates manners and customs; also, the characteristic tone or genius of an institution or social organization.
- n. The traits in a work of art which express the ideal or typic character -- character as influenced by the
ethos (sense 1) of a people -- rather than realistic or emotional situations or individual character in a narrow sense; -- opposed topathos .
WordNet 3.0
- n. (anthropology) the distinctive spirit of a culture or an era
Etymologies
- Greek ēthos, character; see s(w)e- in Indo-European roots.
Examples
“It's such a relaxed and friendly place and the ethos is all part of that. quintessentiallysoho. comThis is”
The Guardian: The members' club that serves up help for homeless people
“This is a story of inclusion and change, a movement from what he calls ethos (custom) to ta ethne (the nations).”
“Our child-porn loving heroes get all upset when that ethos is turned on its head - i.e. an assault by one police officer is an assault by any police officer.”
“And what ethos is it that prevents the public from knowing which public servants represented unlawful combatants?”
“John: And what ethos is it that prevents the public from knowing which public servants represented unlawful combatants?”
“I think your explanation regarding the American ethos is far more accurate than arguing that American industry was founded on a Taylor model.”
“Their ethos is linked to that of New York's Editions: Artists 'Book Fair, whose focus on new editions, young artists and young galleries, "I was hoping to reproduce that back in London" explains Richard Lloyd, Christie's International Head of the Print Department.”
“Fundamentalism, as one of the chief protests against this modern ethos, is not likely to disappear.”
A Conversation with Karen Armstrong, author of The Battle for God
“The ethos is artsy but not quite avant-garde, and there is a sense that these clothes are worn by the designer herself.”
“There is a certain ethos that characterizes a great number of ordinary Republicans – or at least the ordinary Republicans with whom I prefer to spend my time.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘ethos’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4084 more...
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Words
phantasmagoria, eviscerate, avast, simulacrum, varicose, oblique, gestalt, ersatz, vernal, vivace, stellate, synecdoche and 314 more...
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Rhetoric: The Harlot of the Arts
Words to do with rhetoric--study of, history of, practice of, theory of
rhetoric, paralepsis, invention, arrangement, style, memory, delivery, copia, consubstantiation, trope, colon, tricolon and 56 more...
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architecture and design words
fancy words to use when describing architecture and design
beautility, bathos, ephemeral, wabi sabi, ethos, didactic, ascetic, ephemeral, non sequitur, veracity, acumen, maven and 22 more...
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communication words
concise, ethos, cohesive, redundant, circumlocution, logos, pathos, rhetoric, articulate, verbose, taciturn, translate and 4 more...
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Terms for AP Lit
This list is designed to be a reference for my AP Lit. students
symbolism, archetype, polysyndeton, ellipsis, anaphora, diction, asyndeton, chiasmus, syntax, oxymoron, logos, fallacy and 28 more...
jwjarvis the internal executive ethos Dec 4, 2010
qroqqa I am always confused over whether I should be pronouncing this /ˈeθɒs/ (as in ethics) or /ˈiːθɒs/ (as in ether). Whenever I look it up I am confused by the fact that there are two related Greek words εθος ethos and ηθος êthos, and that though ethics comes from the latter it is invariably pronounced with short E.
So εθος ethos meant "custom, habit" but did not really give any English derivatives. The related word ηθος êthos is more complex, giving all of English ethos, ethics, ethology. In the singular its meanings extend to "character, nature", basically what ethos is and what ethics and in part ethology study; in the plural (ηθη êthê) it means "haunts, abodes" of animals and "manners, customs" of people.
Unrelated are short-E ethno- "people" and long-E (in fact AE, Greek αι-) ether, aether "airlike substance/realm". Jun 4, 2009
andrew.simone 'I mean, say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it's an ethos.' Dec 8, 2006