Vicarious

Part of speech: adjective

Pronunciation: /vɪˈkɛəɹi.əs/

Definitions

1. Experienced through observing or hearing about someone else's actions rather than doing something yourself
2. Felt or undergone indirectly by witnessing or learning about another person's experience rather than participating directly
3. Obtained through sympathetic imagination of someone else's actions or emotions without actual personal involvement

Etymology: Latin "vicarius" meant "substituted" or "taking another's place," and it came from "vicis," meaning "change" or "turn." A "vicar" was someone who stood in for another person, which is why the English church office of that name still means a deputy. The adjective "vicarious" took shape in the 17th century by adding the English suffix "-ous" to that Latin root, so it describes something done on behalf of, or in place of, someone else. That substitution idea is the thread running through the modern sense. A "vicarious" thrill is one felt through another person's experience, as when a reader lives an adventure through a character. The word's older meaning of standing in for someone has not disappeared; it survives in the sense of suffering or atoning on another's behalf.

Synonyms: indirect, substitute, secondary, delegated, derived

Antonyms: direct, primary, original, immediate, personal