Noun

(-)

Engaging in sexual activity with another person in exchange for compensation, such as money or other valuable goods.

* {{quote-web

, date = 2013-07-29 , author =David Ingram (reporting for Reuters), Howard Goller & Bill Trott (editing for Reuters) , title = FBI arrests 150 in three days in sex-trafficking sweep , site = news.yahoo.com , url = http://news.yahoo.com/fbi-says-arrested-150-three-days-child-prostitution-154521080.html , accessdate = 2013-07-29 }}

The FBI typically does not investigate adult prostitution', leaving it as a state and local matter, but in recent years it has made child ' prostitution a priority in a program the FBI calls Operation Cross Country. The program includes highway billboards asking people to call the FBI with tips.

Her addiction brought her to the point that prostitution was the only means she had to survive.

(by extension) Debasement for unworthy profit or motives.

The television advertising job was a prostitution of the talents of one of the great writers of the century.

Noun

(en noun)

sexual intercourse, especially on the part of an unmarried person.

(legal) The act of such illicit sexual intercourse between a man and a woman which does not by law amount to adultery.

* 1604' ''I am the sister of one Claudio, Condemn'd upon the act of '''fornication To lose his head; condemn'd by Angelo'' — Shakespeare, ''Measure for Measure , Act 5, Scene 1

* 1611' ''Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, '''fornication , uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. — Galatians 5:19-21 KJV