elective

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   subject to popular election

   elective official

2. 2
   adj

   not compulsory

   elective surgery

3. 3
   adj

   Of, or pertaining to voting or elections; involving a choice between options.

   1697, John Dryden, The Works of Virgil […] translated into English Verse, London: Jacob Tonson, dedicatory preface to the Marquess of Normanby, For his Conscience could not but whisper to the Arbitrary Monarch, that the Kings of Rome were at first Elective, and Govern’d not without a Senate:

4. 4
   adj

   Open to choice; freely chosen; (also, usually) unnecessary; minor.

   After accounting for all of my required courses, there is hardly any room in my schedule for any elective ones.

5. 5
   adj

   Scheduled and nonemergent (regardless of whether necessary or unnecessary and whether minor or serious).

   It was very confusing hearing my cancer surgery being classified as "elective surgery". Am I "electing" to live rather than die?

6. 6
   noun

   Something that is an option or may be freely chosen, especially a course of study.

   I still need to decide which electives to take along with my compulsory courses next semester.

7. 7
   noun

   a course that the student can select from among alternatives

Etymology

From elect + -ive.