Academy

Academy

What does Academy mean in American Law?

The definition of Academy in the law of the United States, as defined by the lexicographer Arthur Leff in his legal dictionary is:

A word used with some frequency in the name of a school (e.g., “Deerfield Academy”), though only rarely applied to a college or university (but see “United States Military Academy”), or to a public school. “Academy” may once have described an institution fitting someplace between high school and college, but the word presently has no such special descriptive power, i.e., if one wants to call a school an academy one can do so, no matter what kind of school it is, high or primary, public or private.

Grammar

This term is a noun.

Etimology of Academy

(You may find academy at the world legal encyclopedia and the etimology of more terms).

late 15c., “the classical Academy,” properly the name of the public garden where Plato taught his school, from French Académie, from Latin Academia, from Greek Akademeia “The Academy; the grove of Akademos,” a legendary Athenian of the Trojan War tales (his name, Latinized as Academus) apparently means “of a silent district”), original estate-holder of the site. The A[cademy], the Garden, the Lyceum, the Porch, the Tub, are names used for the five chief schools of Greek philosophy, their founders, adherents, & doctrines: the A., Plato, the Platonists & Platonism; the Garden, Epicurus, the Epicureans, & Epicureanism; the Lyceum, Aristotle, the Aristotelians, & Aristotelianism; the Porch, Zeno, the Stoics, & Stoicism; the Tub, Antisthenes, the Cynics, & Cynicism. [Fowler] Compare lyceum. By 1540s the word in English was being used for any school or training place for arts and sciences or higher learning. “In the 18th century it was frequently adopted by schools run by dissenters, and the name is often found attached to the public schools in Scotland and Northern Ireland” [Encyclopaedia Britannica,” 1941]; hence, in the U.S., a school ranking between an elementary school and a university. “In England the word has been abused, and is now in discredit in this sense” [OED]. By 1560s it was used for “a place of training” in any sense (riding schools, army colleges). The word also was used of associations of adepts for the cultivation and promotion of some science or art, whether founded by governments, royalty, or private individuals. Hence Academy award (1939), so called for their distributor, the U.S.-based Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (founded 1927).

Resources

See Also

  • Abode
  • Cadet
  • College
  • School
  • Public

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