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The Origin of Nascent
Nascent descends from the Latin verb nasci, meaning “to be born,” as does many an English word, from nation and nature to innate and renaissance. But rather than describing the birth of literal babies—as in pups, kits, hoglets, et al.—nascent is applied to things (such as careers or technologies) that have recently formed or come into existence, as when scholar Danille K. Taylor-Guthrie wrote of Toni Morrison being “an integral part of a nascent group of black women writers who would alter the course of African American, American, and world literature.”
Examples of nascent in a Sentence
Mike Sager, Rolling Stone, 27 June 1996
It was almost 80 years ago that the Wright brothers from Ohio ventured to Kitty Hawk for the uplift its steady winds offered their nascent passion, airplanes.
—Robert R. Yandle, Popular Photography, March 1993
A few centuries late, when the nascent science of geology was gathering evidence for the earth's enormous antiquity, some advocates of biblical literalism revived this old argument for our entire planet.
—Stephen Jay Gould, Granta 16, Summer 1985
The actress is now focusing on her nascent singing career.
one of the leading figures in the nascent civil-rights movement
Michael R. Blood, Fortune, 18 Feb. 2026
Jews have deep roots in basketball, dominating the game in pre-War America, especially at the college level; one famous contest between undefeateds NYU and City College of New York in 1934 featured nine of ten Jewish starters and landed the nascent sport in Newsweek and The New York Times.
—Steven Zeitchik, HollywoodReporter, 18 Feb. 2026
This is the biggest role of Bad Bunny’s nascent acting career.
—Bethy Squires, Vulture, 18 Feb. 2026
Concern over mitochondria has moved from a nascent area of medical research to staple of the trillion-dollar wellness industry.
—Dan Vergano, Scientific American, 13 Feb. 2026
See All Example Sentences for nascent
Cite this Entry
“Nascent.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nascent. Accessed 24 Feb. 2026.
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