intraordinary

in·tra·or·din·a·ry
I1N1T1R1A1O1R1D2I1N1A1R1Y4
UK/ɪntɹəˈɔːdɪn(ə)ɹi/UK/ɪnˈtɹɔːdɪn(ə)ɹi/US/ɪntɹəˈɔɹdɪˌnɛɹi/

adjective

Falling within normal parameters; normal, ordinary.

Scrabble 17

Meanings

adjectiveintraordinary (comparative more intraordinary, superlative most intraordinary)

comparative more intraordinary · superlative most intraordinary · alternative intra-ordinary

  1. nonstandardrareFalling within normal parameters; normal, ordinary.

    "It is a place outside of place," Eunida answered. "Extra-ordinary as opposed to intra-ordinary."

    2006, Jo Treggiari, “Weak Tea and Stewed Chitterlings”, in The Curious Misadventures of Feltus Ovalton, Montreal, Que.: Lobster Press, →ISBN, page 126
    5 more examples

    It goes a great way perhaps towards explaining the secretion of urine, the formation of halitus from the lungs, the insensible and sensible perspiration from the other parts of animals, and the curious and intraordinary production of watery fluids [...]

    1954, Bulletin of the History of Medicine, volume 28, Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins Press, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 224

    My arguments will vary in strength and appeal, but I hope that they are usefully suggestive and present at the minimum a hypothesis worth entertaining. Perhaps we can make some sense of this extraordinary work by making it a little more "intraordinary".

    1994, Ken Dowden, “The Roman Audience of the Golden Ass”, in James Tatum, editor, The Search for the Ancient Novel, Baltimore, Md.; London: Johns Hopkins University Press, →ISBN, page 419

    These, while making no concessions to fair play or diplomatic stances, brought together a form of a benevolently critical lack of knowledge (i.e., ours); a form of extra- and intra-ordinary knowledge (i.e., that of Fei Dawei, an art historian, French since 2000; Fei in Mandarin means "not" or, in certain contexts, "against"); and a form of "absolute" acknowledgement (i.e., by the museum establishment).

    2004, Laura Maggioni, editor, The Monk and the Demon: Contemporary Chinese Art, Lyon: Musée d’art contemporain de Lyon; Milan: 5 Continents, →ISBN, page 8

    Do we not have to accept two kinds of event i.e. intra-ordinary events, which take place on the ground of a given order, and extra-ordinary events, which leave this ground behind and change it? Or in other words, do we not have to presuppose that there are conformable and normal events on the one hand, and deviating and anomalous events on the other hand?

    2007, Bernhard Waldenfels, “Lecture III: The Power of Events”, in The Question of the Other: The Tang Chun-I Lecture for 2004, Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press, →ISBN, page 40

    Ken Dowden's article "The Roman Audience of the Golden Ass" (1994), now the classic statement of this position, straightforwardly seeks to make the eccentric Metamorphoses more "intraordinary" by emphasizing the Roman spatial markers, the survival of the manuscript at Rome, Apuleius' probable residence at Rome, and other factors that give the novel a Roman rather than Carthaginian orientation.

    2014, Ellen Finkelpearl, Luca Graverini, Benjamin Todd Lee, “Introduction”, in Benjamin Todd Lee, Ellen Finkelpearl, Luca Graverini, editors, Apuleius and Africa (Routledge Monographs in Classical Studies; 18), New York, N.Y.; Abingdon, Oxfordshire: Routledge, →ISBN, section 2 (State of the Question), pages 6–7

    Synonyms: unexceptional, unremarkable, average, medial, basic, bog-standard, common, commonplace · Antonyms: extraordinary, superordinary, supraordinary

Synonyms & antonyms

Origin

Translations

French intraordinaire
  • intraordinairefalling withing normal parameters — see also normal, ordinary
Cite this entry
APA

intraordinary. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/intraordinary

MLA

“intraordinary.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/intraordinary. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “intraordinary,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/intraordinary.

Source: intraordinary on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.