zeitgeisty, adj.

zeitgeisty
http://www.oed.com/dictionary/zeitgeisty_adj%3Ftab%3Dmeaning_and_use
First published 2018

# zeitgeistyadjective

## Factsheet

### What does the adjective zeitgeisty mean?

There is one meaning in OED's entry for the adjective zeitgeisty. See ‘Meaning & use’ for definition, usage, and quotation evidence.

### How common is the adjective zeitgeisty?

Fewer than 0.01occurrences per million words in modern written English

2017 | 0.012
2018 | 0.012
2019 | 0.012
2020 | 0.011
2021 | 0.012
2022 | 0.013
2023 | 0.014
2024 | 0.014

### Where does the adjective zeitgeisty come from?

Earliest known use

1960s

The earliest known use of the adjective zeitgeisty is in the 1960s.

OED's earliest evidence for zeitgeisty is from 1966, in the writing of A. Sarris.

### Nearby entries

1. zeep, n. 1878–
2. zeep, v. 1886–
3. zeeping, adj. 1895–
4. zef, adj. 1990–
5. zegadine, n. 1651–
6. zeilanite, n. 1815–
7. zein, n. 1820–
8. Zeiss, n. 1876–
9. zeitgeber, n. 1958–
10. zeitgeist, n. 1848–
11. zeitgeisty, adj.1966–
12. zek, n. 1968–
13. zelant, n. 1624–26
14. zelatrice, n. 1874–
15. zelatrix, n. 1865–
16. Zeldovich, n. 1956–
17. Zelig, n. 1984–
18. Zelig-like, adj. 1983–
19. zelkova, n. 1836–
20. zelotypia, n. 1566–
21. zelotyping, adj. a1660

## Meaning & use

1. 1966–
   Representative or characteristic of the prevailing spirit or mood of a particular time.
   Stressed as ˈzeitgeisty.
   1. 1966

      > What do we see in..those films that are considered most fashionable and zeitgeisty?

      A. Sarris in Art Voices Fall 22/1
   2. 1997

      > It's still a hell of a fun movie—a thrilling marriage of Zeitgeisty satire and timeless scare tactics.

      Newsweek (Nexis) 15 December 70
   3. 2011

      > She goes on to point out that the zeitgeisty penchant for all things Seventies has led cool girls to start using her one-pieces as bodysuits for daytime.

      Harper's Bazaar (U.K. edition) July 44/2

## Frequency

zeitgeisty typically occurs fewer than 0.01 times per million words in modern written English.

zeitgeisty is in frequency band 1, which contains words occurring fewer than 0.001 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands

Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate.

### Frequency of zeitgeisty, adj., 1970–2010

* Occurrences per million words in written English

Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.

The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.

For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.

Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.

Decade | Frequency per million words
--- | ---
1970 | 0.0002
1980 | 0.0002
1990 | 0.0002
2000 | 0.0002
2010 | 0.0003

### Frequency of zeitgeisty, adj., 2017–2024

* Occurrences per million words in written English

Modern frequency series are derived from a corpus of 20 billion words, covering the period from 2017 to the present. The corpus is mainly compiled from online news sources, and covers all major varieties of World English.

Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the corpus.

Period | Frequency per million words
--- | ---
2017 | 0.012
2018 | 0.012
2019 | 0.012
2020 | 0.011
2021 | 0.012
2022 | 0.013
2023 | 0.014
2024 | 0.014

Originally published as part of the entry for zeitgeist, n.

zeitgeisty, adj. was first published in 2018.