From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishyouthyouth /juːθ/ ●●● S2 W2 noun (plural youths /juːðz $ juːðz, juːθs/) 1 [uncountable]SSY the period of time when someone is young, especially the period when someone is a teenager → old agein somebody’s youth Many of these people had used drugs in their youth.RegisterIn everyday English, people usually say when I was young, rather than saying in my youth:They were friends when they were young.2 [countable]SSY a teenage boy – used especially in newspapers to show disapproval a gang of youths► see thesaurus at child, man3 [uncountable]SSY young people in generalthe youth of something The youth of today are the pensioners of tomorrow.4 [uncountable]YOUNG the quality or state of being young OPP age Despite his youth, he had travelled alone. The cream will restore youth and vitality to your skin.COLLOCATIONSverbsspend your youthShe spent her youth in India.relive/recapture your youth (=do things you did when young, to try and experience youth again)The band’s fans are clearly reliving their youth.The sports car is an attempt to recapture his youth.phrasesa misspent youth (=spent doing things that were bad or not useful)He is trying to make up for his misspent youth.your lost youth (=the time long ago when you were young)He wept for his lost youth.the days/dreams/friends etc of somebody’s youthHe had long ago forgotten the dreams of his youth.
Examples from the Corpus
youth• None the less Tupac headed a youth group, the New Afrikan Panthers, performing at community centres.• a church youth group• Caroline had been a ballet dancer in her youth.• She revisited all the places where she had spent her youth.• I studied it in my youth, and my love of Faure, Debussy and Ravel encouraged me to improve it.• This was one of the great questions of my youth in the 60s, of course.• a gang of youths on motorbikes• It had about it the idealism of youth.• There has been a corresponding shift in studies of youth and in the kind of questions asked by sociologists.• This was the first independent radio station in the republic and was to be run by the students' official youth organization.• Some youths astride shining motor-cycles had congregated outside a closed motor-cycle shop.• One of the youths pushed her against the wall and took her bag.• The police had questioned three youths, but then later released them without charge.• Horton teaches at a school for troubled youths in San Diego.• Society seems obsessed with youth and wealth.gang of youths• Over the past year I've been threatened and blackmailed by a gang of youths.• A policeman, white, talking to a gang of youths, black.• A gang of youths threw stones and missiles at officers who were trying to break up the display.the youth of something• These are the youth of our future.• If the wines show a certain lack of intensity, it is probably a result of the youth of the vines.• So should you look for this too in the youth of their killer?• Trevor Sorbie thinks the patronising attitudes of some salons can be explained by the youth of the stylists.• The script they came up with was trendy and repetitive, rather naive but tuned directly to the youth of the moment.• Whatever has happened to the youth of today?• That I feel it sends the wrong message to the youth of the country.• Such deliberation, while the youth of Britain were liable to go up in smoke, outraged many.Origin youth Old English geoguth 