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Avocation   /ˌævəkˈeɪʃən/   Listen
noun
Avocation  n.  
1.
A calling away; a diversion. (Obs. or Archaic) "Impulses to duty, and powerful avocations from sin."
2.
That which calls one away from one's regular employment or vocation. "Heaven is his vocation, and therefore he counts earthly employments avocations." "By the secular cares and avocations which accompany marriage the clergy have been furnished with skill in common life." Note: In this sense the word is applied to the smaller affairs of life, or occasional calls which summon a person to leave his ordinary or principal business. Avocation (in the singular) for vocation is usually avoided by good writers.
3.
pl. Pursuits; duties; affairs which occupy one's time; usual employment; vocation. "There are professions, among the men, no more favorable to these studies than the common avocations of women." "In a few hours, above thirty thousand men left his standard, and returned to their ordinary avocations." "An irregularity and instability of purpose, which makes them choose the wandering avocations of a shepherd, rather than the more fixed pursuits of agriculture."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Avocation" Quotes from Famous Books



... abrupt departure would be less shocking than to stay and take a formal leave of my lover, whose heart was of such a delicate frame, that, after I told him I should one day withdraw myself in his absence, he never came home from the chase, or any other avocation, without trembling with apprehension ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... am only a poor ignorant man. But the type you speak of does exist. In Switzerland, I believe, a bell-ringer has for years been collecting material for a heraldic memorial. I should think," he continued, laughing, "that his avocation would interfere with ...
— La-bas • J. K. Huysmans

... school of design. There were some really beautiful lanterns and wall brackets and reading lamps shown, designed and executed by young women who are self supporting by day and can give only a few evening hours, or an occasional day, to the pursuit of their avocation. One hanging lantern of terra cotta was very fine indeed, and there were many notable fixtures. There must be easily tens of thousands of young people who are students in the various schools of design, manual training high ...
— The House in Good Taste • Elsie de Wolfe

... public hangman in the future by seizing the sick man and hanging him. His friends, hearing of this intention, propped the dying Ketch up in bed, and he, being by trade a shoemaker, had the tools and materials of his trade placed before him. He made a pretence of plying his avocation, and the townsmen, thinking his lease of life was in no danger of a natural termination, allowed him to lie in peace. He then speedily passed away quietly in his bed, and the outwitted burghers found themselves without a hangman, and without ...
— Bygone Punishments • William Andrews

... cannot quite understand," he said, "is the exact meaning of that word 'abduction.' Why should I be suspected of forcibly removing a harmless and worthy young man from his regular avocation, and, as you term it, abducting him, which I presume means keeping him bound and gagged and imprisoned? I do not eat young men. I do not even care for the society of young men. I am not naturally a gregarious person, but I think I would go so far," he added, with a bow towards Miss ...
— The Evil Shepherd • E. Phillips Oppenheim


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