context

English

Etymology

From Latin context(us).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒn.tɛkst/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkɑn.tɛkst/
• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /ˈkɔn.tekst/

Noun

context (countable and uncountable, plural contexts)

2. The surroundings, circumstances, environment, background or settings that determine, specify, or clarify the meaning of an event or other occurrence.

   —In what context did your attack on him happen? —We had a pretty tense relationship at the time, and when he insulted me I snapped.

   • 2012 September 7, Phil McNulty, “Moldova 0-5 England”, in BBC Sport‎^[1]:

     The display and result must be placed in the context that was it was against a side that looked every bit their Fifa world ranking of 141 - but England completed the job with efficiency to record their biggest away win in 19 years.

4. (linguistics) The text in which a word or passage appears and which helps ascertain its meaning.

   Coordinate terms: subtext, paratext, peritext, epitext

   Without any context, I can't tell you if the "dish" refers to the food, or the thing you eat it on.

6. (archaeology) The surroundings and environment in which an artifact is found and which may provide important clues about the artifact's function and/or cultural meaning.
8. (mycology) The trama or flesh of a mushroom.
10. (logic) For a formula: a finite set of variables, which set contains all the free variables in the given formula.
12. (programming) The data (register contents, program counter value, etc.) needed to switch to another thread of execution.

Quotations

• For quotations using this term, see Citations:context.

Antonyms

• isolation

Hyponyms

• subcontext

Derived terms

• context-based learning
• context clue
• context collapse
• context-dependent
• context-free
• context-free grammar
• context-free language
• contextful
• contextless
• context menu
• contextomy
• context-sensitive
• context-sensitive grammar
• high context culture
• high-context culture
• KWIC
• KWOC
• licensing context
• low context culture
• low-context culture
• macrocontext
• metacontext
• microcontext
• out-of-context
• out of context
• put into context
• supercontext
• take out of context

Translations

circumstances or settings

• Afrikaans: konteks (af)
• Armenian: համատեքստ (hy) (hamatekʻst)
• Basque: testuinguru
• Bulgarian: обстано́вка (bg) f (obstanóvka), ситуа́ция (bg) f (situácija)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 場合 / 场合 (zh) (chǎnghé), 情況 / 情况 (zh) (qíngkuàng), 背景 (zh) (bèijǐng), 環境 / 环境 (zh) (huánjìng)

• Czech: kontext (cs) m, souvislosti (cs) f pl
• Danish: kontekst (da) c, sammenhæng c
• Dutch: context (nl) m
• Esperanto: please add this translation if you can
• Finnish: asiayhteys (fi), yhteys (fi), konteksti (fi)
• French: contexte (fr) m
• Galician: contexto (gl) m
• Georgian: please add this translation if you can
• German: Kontext (de) m, Zusammenhang (de) m
• Greek: συμφραζόμενα (el) n pl (symfrazómena), πλαίσιο (el) n (plaísio)
• Hebrew: הֶקְשֵׁר (he) m (héksher)
• Hindi: संदर्भ (hi) m (sandarbh)
• Hungarian: összefüggés (hu), kontextus (hu)
• Icelandic: samhengi (is) n
• Irish: comhthéacs m
• Italian: contesto (it) m
• Japanese: 前後関係 (ぜんごかんけい, zengokankei), 状況 (ja) (じょうきょう, jōkyō)
• Khmer: កាលៈទេសៈ (km) (kaalaʼteisaʼ)
• Korean: 맥락(脈絡) (ko) (maengnak), 짜임새 (ko) (jjaimsae), 바탕 (ko) (batang)
• Latvian: please add this translation if you can
• Lithuanian: please add this translation if you can
• Maori: horopaki
• Mongolian: please add this translation if you can
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: sammenheng (no) m, kontekst (no) m

  Nynorsk: samanheng m, kontekst m

• Persian: وضعلان
• Polish: kontekst (pl) m
• Portuguese: contexto (pt) m
• Romanian: context (ro) n
• Russian: обстано́вка (ru) f (obstanóvka), ситуа́ция (ru) f (situácija), конте́кст (ru) m (kontékst)
• Scottish Gaelic: co-theacsa m
• Spanish: contexto (es) m, marco (es) m
• Swedish: sammanhang (sv) n, kontext (sv) c
• Tagalog: kalamnan
• Telugu: సందర్భం (te) (sandarbhaṁ)
• Thai: please add this translation if you can
• Turkish: please add this translation if you can
• Vietnamese: bối cảnh (vi)

text in which a word appears

• Afrikaans: konteks (af)
• Albanian: kontekst (sq) m
• Arabic: سِيَاق m (siyāq)
• Armenian: համատեքստ (hy) (hamatekʻst), կոնտեքստ (hy) (kontekʻst)
• Azerbaijani: kontekst
• Belarusian: кантэ́кст m (kantékst)
• Bulgarian: конте́кст (bg) m (kontékst)
• Catalan: context (ca) m
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 上下文 (zh) (shàngxiàwén), 語境 / 语境 (zh) (yǔjìng), 前後文 / 前后文 (zh) (qiánhòuwén)

• Czech: kontext (cs) m
• Danish: kontekst (da) c
• Dutch: context (nl) m
• Esperanto: kunteksto
• Estonian: kontekst
• Finnish: asiayhteys (fi), yhteys (fi), konteksti (fi)
• French: contexte (fr) m
• Galician: contexto (gl) m
• Georgian: კონტექსტი (ḳonṭeksṭi)
• German: Kontext (de) m
• Greek: συμφραζόμενα (el) n (symfrazómena)
• Hebrew: הֶקְשֵׁר (he) m (héksher)
• Hindi: संदर्भ (hi) m (sandarbh)
• Hungarian: szövegkörnyezet (hu), kontextus (hu), szövegösszefüggés (hu)
• Icelandic: samhengi (is) n
• Ido: kuntexto (io)
• Indonesian: konteks (id)
• Irish: comhthéacs m
• Italian: contesto (it) m
• Japanese: 文脈 (ja) (ぶんみゃく, bunmyaku), 前後関係 (ぜんごかんけい, zengokankei)
• Kazakh: мәнмәтін (mänmätın), контекст (kontekst)
• Korean: 문맥(文脈) (ko) (munmaek), 맥락(脈絡) (ko) (maengnak)
• Kurdish:

  Northern Kurdish: pêwend (ku) f

• Kyrgyz: контекст (kontekst)
• Latvian: konteksts m
• Lithuanian: kontekstas m
• Macedonian: контекст m (kontekst)
• Malay: konteks
• Manx: co-lhaih, cohecks
• Mongolian:

  Cyrillic: контекст (kontekst)

• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: sammenheng (no) m, kontekst (no) m

  Nynorsk: samanheng m, kontekst m

• Persian: زمینه (fa) (zamine), بافت (fa) (bâft), متن (fa) (matn)
• Polish: kontekst (pl) m
• Portuguese: contexto (pt) m
• Romanian: context (ro) n
• Russian: конте́кст (ru) m (kontékst)
• Scottish Gaelic: co-theacsa m
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: ко̀нтекст m

  Roman: kòntekst (sh) m

• Slovak: kontext m
• Slovene: kontekst m
• Spanish: contexto (es) m
• Swedish: kontext (sv) c
• Tagalog: kalamnan
• Tajik: матн (tg) (matn)
• Tatar: контекст (qontekst)
• Thai: บริบท (bɔɔ-rí-bòt)
• Turkish: bağlam (tr), kontekst (tr)
• Turkmen: kontekst
• Ukrainian: конте́кст m (kontékst)
• Uzbek: kontekst (uz)
• Vietnamese: văn cảnh (vi), ngữ cảnh (vi), mạch văn (vi)
• Welsh: cyd-destun (cy) m

See also

• (surroundings in situ, in archaeology): provenance, provenience; unprovenanced, unprovenienced

Verb

context (third-person singular simple present contexts, present participle contexting, simple past and past participle contexted)

1. (obsolete) To knit or bind together; to unite closely.
   • 1638, Richard Younge, The Drunkard's Character: Or, a True Drunkard with Such Sinnes as Raigne in Him:

     The whole worlds frame, which is contexted onely by commerce and contracts.

   • 1623, Owen Feltham, Resolves: Divine, Moral, Political:

     If the Subiect bee Historie, or contexted Fable, then I hold it better put in Prose, or Blanks: for ordinarie discourse neuer shewes so well in Meeter

Adjective

context (comparative more context, superlative most context)

1. (obsolete) Knit or woven together; close; firm.
   • 1541?, Robert Copland (translator?), Guydon's Questionary Chirurgical, translation of 1533, Guy de Chauliac, La questionaire des cirugiens at barbiers

     The skynne is composed & context and woven with thredes and vaynes.

   • 1662, Robert Boyle, New Experiments Physico-mechanical, Touching the Spring of the Air, and its Effects, page 73:

     And though he could describe how such a string may be context, yet our Explication will have this advantage in point of probability above his, ...

   • 1711-12, William Derham, Physico-theology: Or, A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God, from His Works of Creation (3rd edition, corrected, 1714, page 110)

     the coats, without, are context and callous, firm and strong.

References

• “context”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “context”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.

Catalan

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin contextus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): (Central) [kunˈtekst]
• IPA^(key): (Balearic) [konˈtekst]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [konˈtɛkst]

Noun

context m (plural contexts or contextos)

1. context

Related terms

• contextual

Further reading

• “context” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.
• “context”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2025.
• “context”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], 2007 April

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from Middle French contexte or Latin contextus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈkɔn.tɛkst/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: con‧text

Noun

context m (plural contexten)

1. context

Derived terms

• contextgevoelig
• contextueel

Descendants

• Afrikaans: konteks
• → Indonesian: konteks

Romanian

Etymology

Borrowed from French contexte.

Noun

context n (plural contexte)

1. context

Declension

Declension of context

	singular			plural
	indefinite	definite		indefinite	definite
nominative-accusative	context	contextul		contexte	contextele
genitive-dative	context	contextului		contexte	contextelor
vocative	contextule			contextelor