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Intellectuals may speak of a book or a film as a nullity, claiming it possesses nothing original enough to justify its existence. Legal scholars also use the word; a law passed by a legislature may be called a nullity if, for example, it's so obviously unconstitutional that it's going to be shot down by the courts in no time. And if you're in an unkind mood, you're also free to call a person a nullity, if you're not instead calling him a nobody, a nonentity, or a zero.
Synonyms
Examples of nullity in a Sentence
Giovanni Caforio, WSJ, 29 Aug. 2023
The thousands of votes already cast and those to be cast on Aug. 8, 2023, for mayoral candidates would be a nullity.
—Christina Hall, Detroit Free Press, 7 Aug. 2023
There were pillows on the couch, a whole flotilla of them, and there were two armchairs flanking it, a coffee table, bookshelves, the black nullity of a flat-screen TV affixed to the wall across from her.
—T. Coraghessan Boyle, The New Yorker, 31 Oct. 2022
The overall Pessoan effect—of fertility and nullity overlaid, of a teeming garden spied through the transparent body of a phantom—gathers into a single sensation extremes of modern exuberance and despair.
—Benjamin Kunkel, Harper's Magazine, 26 Oct. 2021
Kyrsten Sinema has spent the last year participating in a Beltway social experiment that might determine whether an intellectual nullity, clad in Instagrammable vintage wear, might be passed off as a brave and serious centrist ideologue.
—Jason Linkins, The New Republic, 9 Oct. 2021
The Vatican announces reforms to the legal structures Catholics must follow to achieve marital nullity.
—Cnn Editorial Research, CNN, 6 June 2021
However, the implementation of the National Security Law in Hong Kong and the electoral-system revamp have rendered it a nullity.
—Aaron Rhodes, National Review, 18 Mar. 2021
Later antislavery champions, including Abraham Lincoln, always considered the Northwest Ordinance to be organic to the Constitution; proslavery advocates came to regard it as an illegitimate nullity.
—Sean Wilentz, The New York Review of Books, 3 Aug. 2020
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These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'nullity.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Word History
1543, in the meaning defined at sense 1a
Dictionary Entries Near nullity
Cite this Entry
“Nullity.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/nullity. Accessed 3 Oct. 2023.
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Legal Definition
nullity
noun
Louisiana Civil Code
Note: A marriage that is an absolute nullity does not have to be annulled to terminate its legal effects (as property rights).
Note: A contract that is a relative nullity may be annulled and the parties restored to their original positions. A marriage that is a relative nullity must be annulled to terminate the legal effects (as property rights) of the marriage.
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