passivity

Etymology

It is formed from English passive + -ity,^[2][3][4] or, in the OED's view, possibly from the Latin source of the adjective with the same suffix, and probably on the model of activity.^[5] The adjective goes back to Latin passīvus (“subject to emotion”), from passus, the past participle of patior (“to suffer”).^[6] Compare Late Latin passivitas, recorded in a grammatical sense in the 3rd century, French passivité, from 1697 in the general sense, and Italian passivitá, from 1673.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The condition of being subject to an outside force, of being affected or acted upon by an external cause: 1659, in Henry More's Immortality of the Soul.^[5] Etymonline and Dictionary.com date it to the 1650s.^[2][7]

Semantic evolution

Before this noun, Middle English used passion for the fact of being acted upon, from about 1400, and passabilite for the capacity to be acted upon or to suffer, from the mid-14th century;^[2] passiveness is also older.^[5] More also used passivity in 1664 for the capability of suffering, a sense last recorded in 1684.^[5] The sense of inertness, an absence of activity or involvement, appears in 1667, and that of submission to another's will in 1681, again in More.^[5] Johnson (1755) defined it simply as passiveness and marked it "an innovated word".^[8] The later technical uses are chemical inactivity (1866), the passive voice in grammar (1871) and, in psychiatry, abnormal inactivity and lack of response (1927).^[5]

Timeline

• 1659 – the state of being acted upon by an external agent.^[5][4]
• 1664 – capability of suffering (obsolete by 1684).^[5]
• 1667 – absence of activity or participation; inertness.^[5]
• 1681 – submission to external force or another's will.^[5]
• 1866 – chemical inactivity, especially of a metal with an inert oxide layer.^[5]
• 1871 – in grammar, passive meaning or construction.^[5]
• 1927 – in psychiatry, unusual inactivity or lack of normal response.^[5]

Meanings

Noun

1. Absence of activity, involvement or effort; inertness: The committee's passivity let the problem grow.^[5][4]
2. Lack of resistance or opposition; submissiveness.^[5][4]
3. The quality or state of being acted upon from outside; an instance of this.^[3][5][4]
4. (chemistry) A state of chemical inactivity, especially of a metal with a thin inert surface layer of oxide.^[5][3][4]
5. (psychiatry) Unusual inactivity or lack of normal responsiveness, often with apathy or helplessness.^[5]
6. (grammar) Passive meaning or construction; the passive voice.^[5][4]
7. (obsolete, 1664–1684) The capability of suffering; passibility.^[5][4]

Related words

• passion
• passionate
• passive
• patience
• patient
• passiveness
• passible

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
7. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
8. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.