assemblage

American  

[uh-sem-blij, a-sahn-blazh] / əˈsɛm blɪdʒ, a sɑ̃ˈblaʒ /

noun

1. a group of persons or things gathered or collected; an assembly; collection; aggregate.

2. the act of assembling; state of being assembled.

3. Fine Arts.

   1. a sculptural technique of organizing or composing into a unified whole a group of unrelated and often fragmentary or discarded objects.

   2. a work of art produced by this technique.

4. Archaeology. the aggregate of artifacts and other remains found on a site, considered as material evidence in support of a theory concerning the culture or cultures inhabiting it.

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assemblage British  

/ əˈsɛmblɪdʒ /

noun

1. a number of things or persons assembled together; collection; assembly

2. a list of dishes served at a meal or the dishes themselves

3. the act or process of assembling or the state of being assembled

4. a three-dimensional work of art that combines various objects into an integrated whole

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assemblage Scientific  

/ ə-sĕm′blĭj /

1. A collection of artifacts from a single datable component of an archaeological site. Depending on the site and culture, an assemblage may be associated with a single limited activity, as with stone tools found at a butchering site, or may reflect a broad range of cultural life, as with artifacts that are found in a communal living site.

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Other Word Forms

• reassemblage
  noun
• subassemblage
  noun

Etymology

Origin of assemblage

From French, dating back to 1695–1705; see origin at assemble, -age

Explanation

An assemblage is a bunch of parts, pieces, or people collected together into an organized group, always for some specific purpose. On August 28, 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech in Washington DC to hundreds of thousands of citizens — an assemblage of people who all wanted to end racism. A computer is an assemblage of wires and microchips. An artist who makes sculptures from trash creates assemblages of recycled materials. The word assemblage is related to assembly — which sometimes refers to a gathering in the gymnasium that you’d like to skip.

Example Sentences

“Lucumí is all about survival and care,” explained Aisha M. Beliso-De Jesús, a professor of American studies at Princeton University and author of “Electric Santería: Racial and Sexual Assemblages of Transnational Religion.”

From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 2, 2025

Assemblages by Teresa Tolliver build fantastic chimeras from trophy-like lion sculptures cobbled together from scavenged elements — “Wild Things,” she calls them.

From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 3, 2023

“There is hostility on online platforms, and it amplifies negative public discourse surrounding homosexuality,” said Hendri Yulius Wijaya, the author of “Intimate Assemblages: The Politics of Queer Identities and Sexualities in Indonesia.”

From New York Times • May 12, 2022

They had previously mined existing video footage to study astronaut culture, but their Sampling Quadrangle Assemblages Research Experiment, dubbed SQuARE, marks the first real off-world “dig.”

From Scientific American • Apr. 1, 2022

The sound of which will make the blood tingle in men’s veins; and whole Armies and Assemblages will sing it, with eyes weeping and burning, with hearts defiant of Death, Despot, and Devil.’

From Cities of the Dawn by Ritchie, J. Ewing (James Ewing)