monoculture

English

Etymology

mono- +‎ culture

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈmɒnəˌkʌlt͡ʃə(ɹ)/, /ˈmɒnoʊˌkʌlt͡ʃə(ɹ)/

Noun

monoculture (countable and uncountable, plural monocultures)

1. (agriculture) The cultivation of a single crop at a time.

   Antonym: polyculture

   • 2023 September 30, Martha Gill, “When Taylor Swift reaps country-sized riches, other artists are squeezed out”, in The Observer‎^[1], →ISSN:

     Monocultures are bad for the environment; as we forced golden, waving wheat to take over the planet, other species faltered and failed, rather than rising on their merits.

   • 2024 May 4, John Naughton, “The internet is in decline – it needs rewilding”, in The Guardian‎^[2]:

     As we Irish discovered in the great famine of 1845-49, monocultures are generally not a good idea and we abandon biodiversity at our peril. Farrell and Berjon make the same point about our online world: the internet has become an extractive and fragile monoculture.

2. (anthropology) A culture or society that lacks diversity; a society marked by monoculturalism.
   • 2023 September 27, Spencer Kornhaber, “The Weirdos Living Inside Our Phones”, in The Atlantic‎^[3]:

     It also isn’t going to be broadcast on TV networks that yearn to re-create the previous century’s monoculture. Our attention spans and tastes keep fracturing, and the ratings for late-night comedy keep declining.

Derived terms

• monocultural
• monoculturalism
• monoculturist

Related terms

• biculture
• oligoculture

Translations

cultivation of a single crop at a time

• Catalan: monoconreu f, monocultiu m
• Czech: monokultura f
• Dutch: monocultuur (nl) f
• Finnish: yksipuolinen viljely, monokulttuuri
• French: monoculture (fr) f
• German: Monokultur (de) f
• Greek: μονοκαλλιέργεια (el) f (monokalliérgeia)
• Irish: monashaothrú m
• Italian: monocoltura f
• Maori: ahutahi
• Polish: monokultura (pl) f
• Scottish Gaelic: tuathanachas singilte m
• Spanish: monocultivo (es) m

culture or society that lacks diversity

• Dutch: monocultuur (nl) f
• French: monoculture (fr) f
• German: Monokultur (de) f
• Irish: monashaothrú m
• Italian: monocultura f

Verb

monoculture (third-person singular simple present monocultures, present participle monoculturing, simple past and past participle monocultured)

1. To cultivate such a crop

Further reading

• monoculture on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

French

Etymology

From mono- +‎ culture.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /mɔ.no.kyl.tyʁ/

• Audio

  (file)

Noun

monoculture f (plural monocultures)

1. monoculture

   Coordinate term: polyculture

   • 1955, Claude Lévi-Strauss, chapter VII, in Tristes Tropiques, Plon, published 1993, →ISBN, page 67; republished as John & Doreen Weightman, transl., Tristes Tropiques, Penguin, 2011, →ISBN:

     L’humanité s’installe dans la monoculture ; elle s’apprête à produire la civilisation en masse, comme la betterave.

     — Mankind has opted for monoculture; it is in the process of creating a mass civilization, as beetroot is grown in the mass.

Further reading

• “monoculture”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Italian

Noun

monoculture f

1. plural of monocultura