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Webster 1913 Edition

Assimilation

As-simˊi-la′tion

,
Noun.
[L.
assimilatio
: cf. F.
assimilation
.]
1.
The act or process of assimilating or bringing to a resemblance, likeness, or identity; also, the state of being so assimilated;
as, the
assimilation
of one sound to another
.
To aspire to an
assimilation
with God.
Dr. H. More.
The
assimilation
of gases and vapors.
Sir J. Herschel.
2.
(Physiol.)
The conversion of nutriment into the fluid or solid substance of the body, by the processes of digestion and absorption, whether in plants or animals.
Not conversing the body, not repairing it by
assimilation
, but preserving it by ventilation.
Sir T. Browne.
☞ The term assimilation has been limited by some to the final process by which the nutritive matter of the blood is converted into the substance of the tissues and organs.

Webster 1828 Edition

Assimilation

ASSIMILA'TION

,
Noun.
1.
The act of bringing to a resemblance.
2.
The act or process by which bodies convert other bodies into their own nature and substance; as, flame assimilates oil, and the food of animals is by assimilation converted into the substances which compose their bodies.
Mineral assimilation is the property which substances possess, in the earth, of appropriating and assimilating to themselves other substances with which they are in contact; a property which seems to be the basis of the natural history of the earth.

Definition 2024

Assimilation

Assimilation

See also: assimilation

German

Noun

Assimilation f ‎(genitive Assimilation, plural Assimilationen)

  1. assimilation

Declension

Related terms

assimilation

assimilation

See also: Assimilation

English

Noun

assimilation ‎(plural assimilations)

  1. The act of assimilating or the state of being assimilated.
    • 1797, An English Lady, A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795,:
      --France swarms with Gracchus's and Publicolas, who by imaginary assimilations of acts, which a change of manners has rendered different, fancy themselves more than equal to their prototypes.
    • 1996 January 26, Bertha Husband, “Double Identity”, in Chicago Reader:
      His work generally is full of assimilations and quotations from art that is not Mexican, and he's said, "Nationalism has nothing to do with my work.
  2. The metabolic conversion of nutrients into tissue.
    • 1908, Washington Gladden, The Church and Modern Life:
      We have great need to be careful in these assimilations; some kinds of food are rich but not easily digested.
  3. (by extension) The absorption of new ideas into an existing cognitive structure.
  4. (phonology) A sound change process by which the phonetics of a speech segment becomes more like that of another segment in a word (or at a word boundary), so that a change of phoneme occurs.
  5. (sociology, cultural studies) The adoption, by a minority group, of the customs and attitudes of the dominant culture.

Translations

Related terms

Anagrams

French

Etymology

assimiler +‎ -ation

Pronunciation

Noun

assimilation f ‎(plural assimilations)

  1. assimilation

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ʔasimilaˈtsi̯oːn/

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