FORMALITY

Formality

A formality is an established procedure or set of specific behaviors and utterances, conceptually similar to a ritual although typically secular and less involved. A formality may be as simple as a handshake upon making new acquaintainces in Western culture to the carefully defined procedure of bows, handshakes, formal greetings, and business card exchanges that may mark two businessmen being introduced in Japan. In legal and diplomatic circles, formalities include such matters as greeting an arriving head of state with the appropriate national anthem.

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formality

Noun

  1. The state of being formal.
  2. Something said or done as a matter of form.
  3. A customary ritual without new or unique meaning.


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: formality
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

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