abstraction

American  

[ab-strak-shuhn] / æbˈstræk ʃən /

noun

• abstractions
  plural

1. an abstract or general idea or term.

2. the act of considering something as a general quality or characteristic, apart from concrete realities, specific objects, or actual instances.

3. an impractical idea; something visionary and unrealistic.

4. the act of taking away or separating; withdrawal.

   The sensation of cold is due to the abstraction of heat from our bodies.

5. secret removal, especially theft.

6. absent-mindedness; inattention; mental absorption.

7. Fine Arts.

   1. the abstract qualities or characteristics of a work of art.

   2. a work of art, especially a nonrepresentational one, stressing formal relationships.

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abstraction British  

/ æbˈstrækʃən /

noun

1. absence of mind; preoccupation

2. the process of formulating generalized ideas or concepts by extracting common qualities from specific examples

3. an idea or concept formulated in this way

   good and evil are abstractions

4. logic an operator that forms a class name or predicate from any given expression See also lambda calculus

5. an abstract painting, sculpture, etc

6. the act of withdrawing or removing

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• abstractional
  adjective
• abstractive
  adjective
• abstractively
  adverb

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• abstractions
  plural

Etymology

Origin of abstraction

First recorded in 1540–50; from Late Latin abstractiōn-, stem of abstractiō “separation,” literally, “a drawing off,” from abstract(us) “drawn off” + -iō noun suffix; see abstract -ion

Explanation

An abstraction is something nonspecific, a concept that isn't concrete. It can also refer to the state of mind in which a person is not paying attention to something but is lost in thought or daydreaming. Abstraction is the noun from the adjective abstract, which derives from the Latin abstrahere "to divert." From that, we can get the idea that an abstraction is something that is drawn away from concrete reality. In the art world, an abstraction is a painting or musical piece created in the style of expressionism, in which a subject is not realistically presented or even recognized, but rather is suggested by an emotional flow of paint or music.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

abstraction abstractions

From there, the abstraction moved onto the plate.

From Salon ● Oct. 3, 2026

This abstraction turned to subterfuge in the challengers’ briefing before the Supreme Court last month.

From Slate ● Sep. 16, 2026

His collection, largely unseen by the public until now, according to Christie’s, reflects Davis’ interest in some of the most influential artistic movements of his lifetime, spanning abstraction, Pop art and Neo-Expressionism.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 8, 2026

Americans are about to feel this abstraction directly.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 7, 2026

The fourth subsection covers issues having to do with excessive abstraction, including overuse of nominalizations and passives.

From "The Sense of Style" by Steven Pinker

The lack of recognition, Feldman argues, reverberates through Caland’s heavily impastoed portraits of Moses and her enigmatic late abstractions such as the rectilinear paintings in the “Silent Letter Series.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 21, 2026

For troops’ families, such abstractions, repeated in media discourse, have concrete consequences when their loved ones don’t come home on time.

From Salon ● Sep. 19, 2026

First, practice distinguishing between what the Constitution says and what judges and justices say about the Constitution, a document riddled with aspirational vagaries and flexible abstractions.

From Slate ● Jul. 20, 2026

Creating these abstractions involves difficult maths, but essentially they filter out useless information, just leaving the AI with useful pictures of the world.

From BBC ● Jul. 2, 2026

The entries in McCandless’s journal contain few abstractions about wilderness or, for that matter, few ruminations of any kind.

From "Into the Wild" by Jon Krakauer