consciousness

American  

[kon-shuhs-nis] / ˈkɒn ʃəs nɪs /

noun

consciousnesses plural

1. the state of being conscious; awareness of one's own existence, sensations, thoughts, surroundings, etc.

2. the thoughts and feelings, collectively, of an individual or of an aggregate of people.

   the moral consciousness of a nation.

3. full activity of the mind and senses, as in waking life.

   to regain consciousness after fainting.

4. awareness of something for what it is; internal knowledge.

   consciousness of wrongdoing.

5. concern, interest, or acute awareness.

   class consciousness.

6. the mental activity of which a person is aware as contrasted with unconscious mental processes.

7. Philosophy. the mind or the mental faculties as characterized by thought, feelings, and volition.

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idioms

1. raise one's consciousness, to increase one's awareness and understanding of one's own needs, behavior, attitudes, etc., especially as a member of a particular social or political group.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• underconsciousness
  noun

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• consciousnesses
  plural

Etymology

Origin of consciousness

First recorded in 1625–35; conscious + -ness

Explanation

When you are awake and aware of your surroundings, that's consciousness. There are different types of consciousness, including social consciousness, being aware of injustices in society. The early Latin word conscius meant "with knowing," but it meant a shared knowledge, a meaning that was retained through the 16th Century. John Locke was the first to describe consciousness in relation to the individual, referring to it as “the perception of what passes in a man’s own mind." If you lose consciousness during the performance, we'll wake you up with some smelling salts!

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

consciousness consciousnesses

That could create new opportunities for studying consciousness, memory, emotional processing, and mental health.

From Science Daily ● Jul. 27, 2026

Memory, desire and moral evasion all complicate the inquiry: It’s pointless, Sammy suggests, “to say that each consciousness is a whole world because each consciousness is a dozen worlds.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 22, 2026

“Totoro is where my consciousness begins,” Miyazaki once said.

From Salon ● Jul. 15, 2026

However, while Aldi is rapidly ascending the ranks of American grocery consciousness, it is not, and may never aim to be, Walmart.

From BBC ● Jul. 12, 2026

This new consensus must begin with dialogue, a conversation that fosters a critical consciousness, a key prerequisite to effective social action.

From "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander

“Alien: Earth” follows a group of children whose consciousnesses are transferred into synthetic adult bodies.

From Salon ● Dec. 14, 2025

Plus, you have all of the 23 other consciousnesses that were on the severed floor that Dichen so beautifully lived out.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 21, 2025

In this inventively loopy sci-fi thriller, employees at that shadowy firm undergo a brain procedure that splits their work and home selves into two separate consciousnesses.

From New York Times ● Dec. 1, 2022

According to her, the woman portrayed as a trickster "sums up our modern fragmented, hyphenated identities and multiple consciousnesses".

From BBC ● Jun. 20, 2022

There are within it antecedents and consequents which are also durations which may be the complete specious presents of quicker consciousnesses.

From The Concept of Nature The Tarner Lectures Delivered in Trinity College, November 1919 by Whitehead, Alfred North

Related Words

• alertness
• apprehension
• awareness
• recognition
• sensibility