legitimacy
Other forms: legitimacies
The noun legitimacy means authenticity. If you found an old copy of the Gettysburg Address in your grandmother's attic, you'd have to question its legitimacy when you realized it was written on the back of a car advertisement.
Legitimacy comes from the Latin verb legitimare, which means lawful. Legitimacy, then, refers to something that is legal because it meets the specific requirements of the law. The legitimacy of various countries' presidential elections is often discussed, with monitors keeping track of the voting procedures to make sure they follow all the necessary rules.
-
lawfulness by virtue of being authorized or in accordance with law
-
antonyms:
-
illegitimacy
unlawfulness by virtue of not being authorized by or in accordance with law
-
type of:
-
lawfulness
the quality of conforming to law
-
illegitimacy
-
undisputed credibility
-
synonyms:
authenticity, genuineness
-
types:
-
real McCoy, real stuff, real thing
informal usage attributing authenticity
-
type of:
-
believability, credibility, credibleness
the quality of being believable or trustworthy
-
real McCoy, real stuff, real thing
- MLA
- APA
- Chicago
Vocabulary lists containing legitimacy
Derived from Latin, the English suffix -acy in English means "the state of" or "the quality or condition of."
On September 28, 2015, President Obama addressed the U.N. General Assembly. The speech covered several pressing international issues, most notably: the deal his administration recently brokered with Iran, the predicament of Syria and the refugees from that country, and the ongoing crisis in Israel. Here are 24 words from the President's speech.