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Contemporary vs Conventional - What's the difference?

contemporary | conventional |

As adjectives the difference between contemporary and conventional

is that contemporary is from the same time period, coexistent in time while conventional is pertaining to a convention, as in following generally accepted principles, methods and behaviour.

As nouns the difference between contemporary and conventional

is that contemporary is someone or something living at the same time, or of roughly the same age as another while conventional is a conventional gilt-edged security, a kind of bond paying the holder a fixed cash payment (or coupon) every six months until maturity, at which point the holder receives the final payment and the return of the principal.

contemporary

English

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • From the same time period, coexistent in time.
  • * Cowley
  • A grove born with himself he sees, / And loves his old contemporary trees.
  • * Strype
  • This king was contemporary with the greatest monarchs of Europe.
  • Modern, of the present age.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2012-01
  • , author=Robert L. Dorit , title=Rereading Darwin , volume=100, issue=1, page=23 , magazine= citation , passage=We live our lives in three dimensions for our threescore and ten allotted years. Yet every branch of contemporary science, from statistics to cosmology, alludes to processes that operate on scales outside of human experience: the millisecond and the nanometer, the eon and the light-year.}}
  • * {{quote-news
  • , year=2012 , date=May 24 , author=Nathan Rabin , title=Film: Reviews: Men In Black 3 , work=The Onion AV Club citation , page= , passage=Men In Black 3 finagles its way out of this predicament by literally resetting the clock with a time-travel premise that makes Will Smith both a contemporary intergalactic cop in the late 1960s and a stranger to Josh Brolin, who plays the younger version of Smith’s stone-faced future partner, Tommy Lee Jones.}}
  • Relatively recent
  • Synonyms

    * contemporaneous

    Antonyms

    * anachronistic: in the wrong time period * archaic

    Noun

    (contemporaries)
  • Someone or something living at the same time, or of roughly the same age as another.
  • ''Cervantes was a contemporary of Shakespeare.
    ''The early mammals inherited the earth by surviving their saurian contemporaries .
  • Something existing at the same time.
  • conventional

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Pertaining to a convention, as in following generally accepted principles, methods and behaviour.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-01, volume=407, issue=8838
  • , page=13 (Technology Quarterly), magazine=(The Economist) , title= Ideas coming down the track , passage=A “moving platform” scheme
  • Ordinary, commonplace.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1922, author=(Ben Travers), title=(A Cuckoo in the Nest)
  • , chapter=2 citation , passage=Mother
  • * 1980 , (Carl Sagan), Cosmos: A Personal Voyage ,
  • The history of our study of our solar system shows us clearly that accepted and conventional ideas are often wrong, and that fundamental insights can arise from the most unexpected sources.
  • Banal]], trite, hackneyed, unoriginal or [[clichéd.
  • Synonyms

    * ("pertaining to a convention"): typical, canonical * ("banal"): stereotypical

    Antonyms

    * ("pertaining to a convention"): atypical, out of the ordinary, unconventional * ("ordinary"): imaginative

    Derived terms

    * conventionalism * conventionalist * conventionally * conventional mortgage loan * conventional war * conventional warfare * conventional weapon * conventional weaponry * conventional wisdom

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (finance) A conventional gilt-edged security, a kind of bond paying the holder a fixed cash payment (or coupon) every six months until maturity, at which point the holder receives the final payment and the return of the principal.