Section

Section (pronounced sek-shuhn)

(1) A part cut off or separated.

(2) A distinct part or subdivision of anything (object, data set, country, social class, military establishment et al).

(3) In text, a distinct part or subdivision within a document or set of documents (periodicals, newspapers, legal codes et al), the idea emulated in many forms of broadcasting.

(4) One of a number of parts that can be fitted together to make a whole or a larger component.

(5) An act or instance of cutting; separation by cutting.

(6) In surgery, the making of an incision or the physical incision (in medical slang, “section” & “Caesar” contest the right to be the colloquial short form for “Caesarean section” with the latter apparently the winner.

(7) In pathology, a thin slice of a tissue taken for microscopic examination (sometimes called a specimen although section has a specific technical meaning related to its suitability for use in microscopy.

(8) In all physical sciences, a slice or part (of a mineral, metal, plant etc) removed for examination or other purposes.

(9) A graphical or mathematical representation of an object as it would appear if cut by a plane, showing its internal structure (in architecture, engineering etc).

(10) In geometry, a plane surface formed by cutting through a solid; the shape or area of such a plane surface.

(11) In geology, a sequence of rock layers.

(12) In North American land law (some jurisdictions in US & Canada), an area one mile square (640 acres; 2.6 km²; 259 hectares).

(13) In New Zealand land law a plot of land (of varying size) for building on, especially in a suburban area

(14) In military establishments, classically a small unit (as few as 6-8) consisting of two or more squads (as few as 2+3), several squads when assembled comprising a platoon (terminology and numbers vary greatly between militaries and branches within).

(15) In military terminology any small tactical grouping, either standing or created ad-hoc for specific missions; as “staff section”, the administrative and organizational apparatus attached to an operational unit or units.

(16) In the design of carriages for railroads, a division of a sleeping car containing both an upper and a lower berth.

(17) In railroad administration, a length of track, roadbed, signal equipment etc, maintained by one crew.

(18) In mass-transit, any of two or more trains, buses, trams etc, running on the same route and schedule at the same time, one right behind the other, and considered as one unit, as when a second is necessary to accommodate more passengers than the first can carry.

(19) In mass transit (Australia & New Zealand), a fare stage on a bus, train or tram etc (similar to the sectors used by airlines).

(20) In botany, a segment of a naturally segmented fruit, as of an orange or grapefruit.

(21) In botany, a taxonomic rank below the genus (and subgenus if present), but above the species.

(22) In zoology, an informal taxonomic rank below the order ranks and above the family ranks.

(23) In art, as “sectional art”, a single work designed to be displayed as separate pieces (as opposed to the single piece collage or montage (made from many components) or the diptych, triptych, polyptych etc (where all the pieces are in some way attached to create a (usually) symmetrical whole.

(24) In music, a division based on the instruments used or their purpose (rhythm section; brass section; string section et al).

(25) In music, an extended division of a composition or movement that forms a coherent part of the structure.

(26) In publishing, as the section mark (sometimes called the signature), a mark used to indicate a subdivision of a book, chapter etc or as a mark of reference to a footnote (the symbol § denotes a section in a document)

(27) In bookbinding (sometimes called the signature, gathering, gather or quire) a folded printing sheet or sheets ready for gathering and binding.

(28) In live theatre, one of a series of circuits for controlling certain lights (footlight, down-lights et al).

(29) In category theory, a right inverse.

(30) In some jurisdictions, a mechanism by which a mentally disturbed person may be confined in an institution (under appropriate statute) for examination to determine whether a longer or permanent order of confinement is justified.

(31) In military slang (as “to section” or “section 8”), to dismiss an individual from the service on mental health grounds.

1550-1560: From the Middle English seccioun (in astronomy, “the intersection of two straight lines; a division of a scale”), from the Old French section, from the Latin sectionem (stem of sectiō) (a cutting; cutting off, excision, amputation of diseased parts of the body etc), from sectus, past participle of secāre (to cut), from the primitive Indo-European root sek (to cut).   The construct was sec(t) (āre) + -iōn.  The meaning “a part cut off or separated from the rest” dates from the early fifteenth century while that of a “drawing representing something as if cut through” was from the 1660s.  In English, from the 1550s, there was the sense of “an act of cutting or dividing”; that is now archaic or preserved only in some aspects of engineering and in medical phrases, most famously the Caesarian section.  The meaning “a subdivision of a written work, statute etc” was first noted in the 1570s when the structure in publishing was (more or less) standardized: books divided into chapters, chapters into sections and sections into paragraphs or breaks, a system still reflected by modern word-processing software.  Section can have defined meanings (such as in publishing or land law) but the in general use the synonyms include cut, division, snippet, part, segment, slice, piece & specimen.  Section is a noun & verb, sectionalism & sectionality are nouns, sectioning is a noun & verb, sectional & sectionary are nouns & adjectives, sectioned is a verb (and a non-standard adjective), sectionable is an adjective and sectionally is an adverb; the noun plural is sections.

Three-piece sectional art, distinguished a triptych in that the three sections are hung separately.  Some commercial galleries do describe such products as "triptychs" because the word has such an association with "high art". 

In music, although functionally the distinctions had long been understood, the idea of sections in a band or orchestra didn’t come into use until the 1880s (the sections either by type (strings) or function (rhythm).  The use of section to describe the one square mile (640 acres) blocks used for purposes of sub-dividing public lands dates from 1785.  The famous “section 8” began as World War II (1939-1945) US military slang referring to the passage in army regulations under which as soldier could be discharged from the service for reasons of mental illness (not necessarily defined as insanity).  The verb section came into use in publishing in the early nineteenth century in the sense of “divide a text into sections”, extended by the 1890s to “cut through so as to present a section”.  The adjective sectional in the sense of “pertaining to a division of a larger part” was first noted in 1806 but it is mere coincidence this was the year in which the thousand year old Holy Roman Empire was dissolved.  It originally did mean “of or pertaining to some particular section or region of a country as distinct from others”, something would soon often be heard in the US political vocabulary in the decades leading up to the Civil War (1861-1965).  The noun sectionalism emerged in parallel an originally meant “sectional prejudice or spirit; the clashing of sectional interests” but it soon added the sense “a confinement of interests to a local sphere”.  It was in use in US English by 1836 but, again under the influence of those forces which would lead to the Civil War, it was in frequent use by the mid-1850s.

The meaning “composed or made up of several independent sections that fit together” was in use in engineering and other mechanical fields by the mid-eighteenth century.  The specific noun meaning “piece of furniture composed of sections which can be used separately” appeared in the early 1960s (a clipping of sectional seat, sectional sofa etc in use since 1949) but the preferred modern descriptor is “modular”.  The noun cross-section (section of something made by a plane passing through it at a right angle to one of its axes) dates from 1748 and was first applied to the sketches and plans of engineers and architects.  In the early twentieth century, it picked up the figurative sense of “a representative sample”, emerging apparently in the social sciences before entering general use.  The noun subsection (also as sub-section) (part or division of a section) dates from the 1620s.  The noun midsection (also as mid-section) (middle of the human body, the midriff or belly) was coined in the 1930s for commercial purposes.  Other forms (quarter-section, half-section, multi-section, un-sectioned, bisection etc were coined as the need arose.

Lindsay Lohan in sections, hung above a "sectional sofa".  "Sectional furniture" was first advertised in the late 1940s and offered more flexibility in that the pieces could be assembled in a variety of configurations, better to suit the available space.  The modern trend is to describe such pieces as "modular furniture" but the art is still sectional; modular art is something different. 

The military slang (as “to section” or “section 8”) referred to World War II (1939-1945) US Army regulations (detailed in Section VIII) under which an individual could be dismissed from the service on mental health grounds.  These grounds provided for the discharge of men who were deemed mentally unfit for military service so didn’t exactly follow the conventions followed in civilian medicine; proven (or confessed) homosexuality could for example be the grounds for a Section VIII discharge.  The term entered popular culture in the post-war years when it was used in fictional depictions of military life, often as a humorous device following the attempts of soldiers to be “sectioned” as a way out of the military.  Most militaries have since adopted practices which align more closely with the mainstream handling of mental health conditions.

The Caesarian section (delivery of a baby by cutting through the abdomen of the mother) was apparently first described as “a section” in 1923 although “a Caesar” seems to be the preferred modern medical slang.  The operation had first been documented in the 1530s and the name was based on that supposedly being the method by which Julius Caesar (100-44 BC; Roman general and dictator of Rome 49-44 BC) was delivered.  Modern thought has rejected that notion and the legend thus also accounts for the historic tracing of his cognomen to the Latin caesus, past participle of caedere (to cut).  If there’s any basis to this, it may have been an ancestor who was so born because Caesar's mother lived to see his adulthood and there’s no record of any woman in antiquity surviving the procedure which was performed usually when the mother had already died.  Modern medical analysts concur with the improbability of the link and the first known attempt to on a live woman was in the early sixteenth century and as late as the 1800s, before antiseptics and blood transfusions were routinely available, there was a 50% mortality rate.