african
/ˈæf.ɹɪ.kən/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: 4.82 in modern English
12
Scrabble Score
7
Letters
3
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Of or pertaining to Africa.
noun
A native of Africa; also one ethnologically belonging to an African race.
Example Sentences
- "Spain’s Melilla, one of two small exclaves of EU land on the African continent, has long been the strongest distillation of fortress Europe."
- "The truth is that I know the guy had African skin and a shirt of some sort."
- "In vivo and in vitro approaches in understanding the differences between Caucasian and African skin types: […]"
- "Africans constitute significantly growing populations not only in major urban centers such as New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, and Atlanta but also in small and midsize cities in states such as Ohio and Maine."
- "But new research suggests another possibility: all Africans may have ancestry from “West Eurasian” populations which moved back into Africa after the “Out of Africa” event ~50,000 years ago.[…]"
- "The Cameroonian’s case is unique as many Africans denied Schengen visas rarely appeal or contest the decisions in court."
Etymology
Attested as a noun in early New English Aphricane, Africans (plural), Middle English as Affrican, Aufrican and Old English as Africanas (“Africans”) (only plural). From Latin āfricānae, from āfricānus, from Āfricus. The adjective appears in the 16th century, as Affricane, Africane, African. Latin Āfricus is from Āfri (singular Āfer), the name of an ancient people of North Africa (near Carthage, in Tunisia), with the suffix -icus. āfricānus is formed by addition of the -ānus suffix. By surface analysis, Africa + -an.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: -, āfricānae
Inflected Forms
more African (comparative)
most African (superlative)
Afrikan (alternative, sometimes)
Afric (alternative, archaic)
Africans (plural)