impropriety

From French impropriété, from Latin improprietās. By surface analysis, improper +‎ -iety or im- +‎ propriety.

• IPA^(key): /ˌɪm.pɹəˈpɹaɪ.ɪ.ti/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

impropriety (countable and uncountable, plural improprieties)

1. (uncountable) The condition of being improper.
   • 1842, [anonymous collaborator of Letitia Elizabeth Landon], “(please specify the page)”, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume II, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, pages 295–296:

     If so many ladies of rank wrote books, there could be no impropriety in her following their example,...

   • 2003, Gary Koop, Bayesian Econometrics (John Wiley & Sons Ltd.), p. 23

     To see the impropriety of this noninformative prior, note that the posterior results (2.19)–(2.22) can be justified by as [sic] combining the likelihood function with the following ‘prior density’: […]

2. (countable) An improper act.
   • 1978, Richard Nixon, RN: the Memoirs of Richard Nixon‎, Grosset & Dunlap, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 421:

     Bayh and his supporters ended up maintaining that it was no longer sufficient that a nominee had not engaged in any impropriety; now there must be no "appearance" of impropriety. Thus opponents of a nominee could raise an "appearance" of impropriety by false charges and thereby defeat him. It was a vicious circle: the nominee would not be condemned for what he had done but for what he had been accused of having done by his detractors.

3. Improper language.