[f. as prec. + -ITY.]
1. The quality or state of being conventional; conventional character or style; obedience to mere convention (in conduct or art).
1842. G. S. Faber, Provinc. Lett. (1844), II. 341. Its plain sense in the familiar conventionality of language.
1846. Poe, A. C. Mowatt, Wks. 1864, III. 43. The hack conventionality of the stage.
1875. Farrar, Seekers, III. i. 269. The conventionality of modern life.
2. A conventional thing or practice.
a. 1834. Lamb, Lett. to Coleridge (L.). It is strong and sturdy writing; and breaks up a whole legion of conventionalities.
1881. W. Collins, Bl. Robe, I. 9. He hated those trivial conventionalities of society in which other people delight.
b. The conventionalities: all that is conventionally regarded by society as fit and proper. (Cf. the proprieties.)
1832. Examiner, 10 June, 4/2. Many of her [Mrs. Gore’s] portraits are excellent; true to nature as fashioned by the conventionalities of modern society.
1854. H. Miller, Sch. & Schm., xviii. (1860), 199/1. A man who sacrificed scarce anything to the conventionalities.
1886. Pall Mall G., 3 Sept., 3/2. Dwellers in great capitals are abject slaves of the conventionalities.
