belonging

• (General American) IPA^(key): /bɪˈlɔŋɪŋ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /bɪˈlɒŋɪŋ/

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• Rhymes: -ɒŋɪŋ
• Hyphenation: be‧long‧ing

From Middle English belonginge, belanging, belangand, equivalent to belong +‎ -ing.

belonging

1. present participle of belong

From belong +‎ -ing.

belonging (countable and uncountable, plural belongings)

1. (uncountable) The feeling that one belongs.

   I have a feeling of belonging in London.

   A need for belonging seems fundamental to humans.

2. (countable, chiefly in the plural) Something physical that is owned.

   Make sure you take all your belongings when you leave.

   • c. 1604, William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure, Act I, Scene 1,

     […] Thyself and thy belongings

     Are not thine own so proper as to waste

     Thyself upon thy virtues, they on thee.

   • 1939, John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, New York: Compass, 1958, Chapter 9, p. 117,

     In the little houses the tenant people sifted their belongings and the belongings of their fathers and of their grandfathers. Picked over their possessions for the journey to the west.

   • 1966, Truman Capote, In Cold Blood, New York: Modern Library, 1992, Part I, p. 22,

     Now, upstairs, she changed into faded Levis and a green sweater, and fastened round her wrist her third most valued belonging, a gold watch […]

3. (plural only, colloquial, dated) family; relations; household.
   • 1854, William Makepeace Thackeray, The Newcomes, London: Bradbury & Evans, Chapter 33, p. 322,

     When Lady Kew said Sic volo, sic jubeo [Thus I will, thus I command], I promise you few persons of her ladyship’s belongings stopped, before they did her biddings, to ask her reasons.

   • 1896, Joseph Conrad, An Outcast of the Islands, Part II, Chapter Three,

     As soon as the principal personages were seated, the verandah of the house was filled silently by the muffled-up forms of Lakamba’s female belongings.

• (something physical that is owned): possession, thing

• englobing