Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Secrecy; privacy.
  • noun Retirement; seclusion from company or society.
  • noun The state of an individual in the rank of a common citizen, or not invested with office.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun Seclusion from company or society; retirement; privacy; secrecy.
  • noun The state of one not invested with public office.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The quality or state of being private.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the condition of being concealed or hidden
  • noun the quality of being secluded from the presence or view of others

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

private +‎ -ness

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Examples

  • Publicness vs. privateness is an overly reductive metric to use when talking about reform.

    Matthew Yglesias » A Historic Achievement 2010

  • 'privateness' with Cobham only concerned business, in which the latter sought to make use of his experience.

    Raleigh Edmund Gosse 1888

  • Not least because it can lead to excessive introspection, individuality, and indeed all forms of privateness were perfidious, and so playing hooky could mean jeopardizing your well-being.

    BREAKFAST WITH SOCRATES ROBERT ROWLAND SMITH 2010

  • By depriving you of your privateness, emptying your inner thoughts out into the public square, they save you from implosion, and by dismantling the barrier between you and society, thus assimilating you into one larger whole, they remove the opportunity, and with it the desire, for playing hooky.

    BREAKFAST WITH SOCRATES ROBERT ROWLAND SMITH 2010

  • Not least because it can lead to excessive introspection, individuality, and indeed all forms of privateness were perfidious, and so playing hooky could mean jeopardizing your well-being.

    BREAKFAST WITH SOCRATES ROBERT ROWLAND SMITH 2010

  • By depriving you of your privateness, emptying your inner thoughts out into the public square, they save you from implosion, and by dismantling the barrier between you and society, thus assimilating you into one larger whole, they remove the opportunity, and with it the desire, for playing hooky.

    BREAKFAST WITH SOCRATES ROBERT ROWLAND SMITH 2010

  • With the possible exception of Ronald Reagan, whose fabled aloofness and privateness were probably signs of a deep introverted streak (many actors, I've read, are introverts, and many introverts, when socializing, feel like actors), introverts are not considered "naturals" in politics.

    Now Please Shush! 2007

  • This almost pathological privateness isn't my natural character, but learned behaviour.

    Archive 2009-03-01 juliette 2009

  • This almost pathological privateness isn't my natural character, but learned behaviour.

    But seriously... juliette 2009

  • With the possible exception of Ronald Reagan, whose fabled aloofness and privateness were probably signs of a deep introverted streak (many actors, I've read, are introverts, and many introverts, when socializing, feel like actors), introverts are not considered "naturals" in politics.

    Archive 2007-11-01 2007

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