Contraception

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A range of methods and devices designed to prevent fertilization and manage reproductive choices effectively during sexual relations
2. Methods and devices employed to inhibit fertilization, enabling individuals to exercise control over their reproductive health during sexual encounters
3. A variety of techniques and tools intended to prevent conception, allowing people to make informed decisions about their reproductive lives

Etymology: Contraception is a surprisingly recent coinage. Its parts are Latin: "contra" meaning "against" and "conception," from "conceptio," the act of becoming pregnant or of forming an idea. The sense "prevention of conception" appears in English only in the 1880s, and the word is usually credited to the medical and social reformers who were then debating birth control openly. Before that, people spoke of "preventives," "checks," or simply of limiting families, so the vocabulary of the late nineteenth century had to be built more or less from scratch. The word's early life was contentious. Campaigners such as Margaret Sanger in the United States used "birth control," which sounded like a political demand, while medical writers preferred the more clinical "contraception," which sounded like a technical fact. For a time the two terms competed, and the Latinate, neutral-sounding version gradually won out in medicine and in later public health writing.

Synonyms: birth control, family planning, preventive measure, contraceptive method, fertility control