academy

pronunciation

How to pronounce academy in British English: UK [əˈkædəmi] word uk audio image

How to pronounce academy in American English: US [əˈkædəmi] word us audio image

Noun:

a secondary school (usually private)
an institution for the advancement of art or science or literature
a school for special training
a learned establishment for the advancement of knowledge

Word Origin

academy: academy: [16] Borrowed either from French académie or from Latin acadēmia, academy goes back ultimately to Greek Akadēmíā, the name of the place in Athens where the philosopher Plato (c. 428–347 BC) taught. Traditionally thought of as a grove (‘the groves of Academe’), this was in fact more of an enclosed piece of ground, a garden or park; it was named after the Attic mythological hero Akadēmos or Hekadēmus. In its application to the philosophical doctrines of Plato, English academy goes back directly to its Latin source, but the more general meanings ‘college, place of training’ derive from French.

academy (n.): late 15c., "the classical Academy," from French Académie, from Latin Academia, from Greek Akademeia "grove of Akademos," a legendary Athenian of the Trojan War tales (his name apparently means "of a silent district"), whose estate, six stadia from Athens, was the enclosure where Plato taught his school. The A[cademy], the Garden, the Lyceum, the Porch, the Tub, are names used for the five chief schools of Greek philosophy, their founders, adherents, & doctrines: the A., Plato, the Platonists & Platonism; the Garden, Epicurus, the Epicureans, & Epicureanism; the Lyceum, Aristotle, the Aristotelians, & Aristotelianism; the Porch, Zeno, the Stoics, & Stoicism; the Tub, Antisthenes, the Cynics, & Cynicism. [Fowler] Sense broadened 16c. into "any school or training place." Academy awards (1941) so called for their distributor, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.