Adjacency

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /əˈdʒeɪsənsi/

Definitions

1. The condition of being near or directly beside another object or place
2. The quality or state of lying close to or adjoining something else in space
3. A spatial relationship where one thing is immediately next to another without any intervening objects

Etymology: "Adjacency" is a noun formed in English from "adjacence," with the common "-y" ending added. "Adjacence" itself comes from Latin "adjacentia," the plural of "adjacens," meaning "lying near" or "lying next to." That Latin form is built from "ad-," meaning "to" or "toward," and "jacere," "to lie" or "to throw," so the underlying picture is of something lying alongside another thing. Because the "-y" suffix is an English addition, "adjacency" is a later, more abstract formation than its parent noun. The result is a word that names the condition of being near rather than the near thing itself, which is why it is most often used for relationships of position, such as in mathematics, computing and urban planning, where the key question is simply which things lie next to which.

Synonyms: proximity, nearness, contiguity

Antonyms: distance, remoteness