segregation

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin sēgregātiō,^[2][3][4][5] a noun of action from sēgregō (“to separate from the flock, set apart, isolate, divide”).^[2][3][6] The Latin verb is formed from sē- (“apart from”) and grex (“herd, flock”),^[2][3][4] from Proto-Indo-European *ger- (“to gather”).^[3] It is related to segregate, gregarious and aggregate.^[4][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

Separation from a church or religious body, usually in a reproachful sense, schism: before 1555, in a letter of J. Philpot printed by Coverdale; this sense was obsolete by 1680.^[2] Etymonline dates the first sense, "act of separating", to the 1550s.^[3]

Semantic evolution

Etymonline notes that the verb segregate was at first often used of separating the flock of the godly from sinners, and later of scientific classification.^[3] From the 1610s the noun was used for setting part of a community or group apart from the rest (1615),^[2][3] and it was used from 1617 for separating parts or constituents of a compound or mixture.^[2] Shakespeare used it in Othello for the breaking up of a fleet, a sense Johnson (1755) still illustrated with that line^[8][2] and which Merriam-Webster labels obsolete.^[6] The state of being segregated is recorded from 1668.^[2][3] In genetics the word has meant the separation of paired alleles, especially at meiosis, since 1902.^[2][9] The sense of enforced separation of races is attested in the United States from 1883 in Etymonline,^[3] and in the OED from 1903,^[2] and the isolation of dangerous prisoners from 1952.^[2] Mapping Metaphor records a link from part–whole relationships to social attitudes from the first half of the 20th century.^[10]

Timeline

• before 1555 – separation from a church, schism (obsolete by 1680).^[2]
• 1563 – a segregated body, at first a schismatic one.^[2]
• 1615 – separation of part of a community from the rest.^[2][3]
• before 1616 – dispersion, breaking up, in Shakespeare's Othello.^[2]
• 1617 – separation of parts of a compound or mixture.^[2]
• 1668 – the condition of being segregated.^[2][3]
• 1883 – enforced separation of races, in the United States.^[3]
• 1902 – in genetics, separation of paired alleles.^[2]
• 1952 – separate confinement of troublesome prisoners.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The act or process of segregating, or the state of being segregated: the segregation of recyclable waste.^[9][6][11]
2. The policy or practice of separating people of different races, classes or ethnic groups in schools, housing and public facilities, especially as a form of discrimination.^[9][11][2]
3. (genetics) The separation of paired alleles or homologous chromosomes, especially during meiosis.^[9][11][2]
4. (metallurgy) The separating out of a component of an alloy in small regions of the solid or on its surface.^[11]
5. The separate confinement of dangerous or troublesome prisoners, or the part of a prison set aside for it.^[2]
6. (obsolete) Dispersion or breaking up, as of a fleet.^[6][2][8]

Word family

• segregational
• segregationist
• antisegregation
• nonsegregation
• resegregation
• ultrasegregationist
• administrative segregation

Related words

• segregate
• segregator
• gregarious
• congregate
• aggregate
• desegregation

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
9. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
10. ^ Mapping Metaphor with the Historical Thesaurus, University of Glasgow, mappingmetaphor.arts.gla.ac.uk
11. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins