etic
e·tic/ˈɛtɪk/adjective
etic is an adjective meaning “Of or pertaining to analysis of a culture from a perspective situated outside that culture” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled E-T-I-C and has 2 syllables (e·tic), and it appears about once in every 36 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).
What does etic mean?
adjective
- 1
Of or pertaining to analysis of a culture from a perspective situated outside that culture.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce etic?
- /ˈɛtɪk/
Etic has 2 syllables, split e·tic in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Forms of etic
- more etic comparative
- most etic superlative
- more -etic comparative
- most -etic superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is etic?
Etic appears about once in every 36 million words in written English, the 184,844th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Etic in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does etic come from?
Coined by American linguist Kenneth Pike in 1954 from phonetic.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).