background

Reading level: hard

Estimated CEFR level: B2 — Upper-Intermediate

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

noun a person's social heritage: previous experience or training
noun the part of a scene (or picture) that lies behind objects in the foreground
noun information that is essential to understanding a situation or problem

From back + ground. Compare backstory.

In background, line of the Snows. — The Works of Rudyard Kipling: One Volume Edition, Rudyard Kipling
Redfern’s son and the patent-medicine background. — The Blue Castle: a novel, L. M. (Lucy Maud) Montgomery
Rembrandt has such backgrounds to his pictures. — Notre-Dame de Paris, Victor Hugo

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