faculty

Pronunciation key ( fak′ʼl-ti ) ( fak′əl·tē ) * Funk and Wagnalls and Websters somewhat differentiate on pronunication key.

facul•ty

n. Inflected Form: pl. -ties (-tiz)

[<OF faculté <L facultas, -tatis < facilis See FACILE] F&W
[ME. faculte; OFr. faculté, L. facultas < facilis See FACILE] Websters

1. An ability.
2. Formerly, power to do, perform a particular action. [Archaic] What a person is trained to do, a trade.
3. A mode of physical characteristics, to hear, see, smell, taste, or in psychology, any of the powers thought to compose the mind, will, reason, et cetera.
4. Behaviors regarded as naturally endowed or acquired such as seeing, feeling, reasoning. A natural or specialized ability in any living organism.
5. Some special form of skill, unusual abilities, whether natural or acquired.
6. Skill which has been acquired through practice, a knack, special aptitude, such as "She has a faculty for making lasting friendships."
7. Natural complex capacities, perception, memory, thought, et cetera. The innate ability to act or do, or possessing a natural aptitude.
8. [< L. facultas translation of Aristotle's dynamis, branch of learning].
9. Members of a learned profession such as law or medicine.
10. Body of instructors in a university or school of higher learning.
11. The complete collective of teaching staff.
12. A power conferred by authority or authorization.
13. A department of learning, a division within said institution, i.e., the English faculty.
14. Within Roman Catholicism the right to perform certain ecclesiastical functions which are normally forbidden, bestowed by a prelate upon their subordinate; power of privilege in general bestowed or otherwise obtained (in the plural). Dispensation.
15. The act of proficiently performing tasks, for instance "A gardener of notable faculty".
16. Pecuniary resources or means.

Synonyms: Ability, Talent

Faculty is a term applied to designate a collective group of professors and other staff in an institute, college or university. Also the instructors within any department of such an institution, such as faculty of law, theology, the arts, or of medicine. It sometimes is employed to designate collectively, members of learned professions such as the faculty of advocates, the medical faculty.

In mental science, it is believed to be a natural power of the mind through which it acts uniformly and with facility in some specific way. Some writers define faculty as a power under the control of one's own will, having a specific task to perform, and as examples enumerates memory, seeing, love and judgment. Others hold that faculty is a power derived from nature differing from ability in that the latter is derived either from circumstances or otherwise.

References

Webster's Vest Pocket Dictionary, ©1912

Webster's New World Dictionary of the American Language (College Edition) ©1955

The New World Family Encyclopedia, ©1955

Funk and Wagnall's Standard Dictionary, Comprehensive International Edition, ©1976

Merriam-Webster Dictionary & Thesaurus, ©2004