INADVERTENCE

Pronunciation (US):

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does inadvertence mean? 

• INADVERTENCE (noun)
  The noun INADVERTENCE has 2 senses:

1. an unintentional omission resulting from failure to notice something

2. the trait of forgetting or ignoring your responsibilities

  Familiarity information: INADVERTENCE used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• INADVERTENCE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

An unintentional omission resulting from failure to notice something

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Synonyms:

inadvertence; oversight

Hypernyms ("inadvertence" is a kind of...):

omission (neglecting to do something; leaving out or passing over something)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The trait of forgetting or ignoring your responsibilities

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

heedlessness; inadvertence; inadvertency; unmindfulness

Hypernyms ("inadvertence" is a kind of...):

attentiveness (the trait of being observant and paying attention)

Derivation:

inadvertent (happening by chance or unexpectedly or unintentionally)

 Context examples 

And is no allowance to be made for inadvertence, or for spirits depressed by recent disappointment?

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

Some of our sailors, whether out of treachery or inadvertence, had informed the pilots that I was a stranger, and great traveller; whereof these gave notice to a custom-house officer, by whom I was examined very strictly upon my landing.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

We are not boy and girl, to be captiously irritable, misled by every moment's inadvertence, and wantonly playing with our own happiness." And yet, a few minutes afterwards, she felt as if their being in company with each other, under their present circumstances, could only be exposing them to inadvertencies and misconstructions of the most mischievous kind.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)