conventionalize
Americanverb (used with object)
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to make conventional.
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Art. to represent in a conventional manner.
verb
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to make conventional
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to simplify or stylize (a design, decorative device, etc)
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of conventionalize
First recorded in 1850–55; conventional + -ize
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
"I thought it was only women who were privileged to change their mind," she began brightly; but Arkwright ignored her attempt to conventionalize the situation.
From Miss Billy — Married by Eleanor H. (Eleanor Hodgman) Porter
They're just going to disorganize me, conventionalize me completely.
From This Side of Paradise by F. Scott (Francis Scott) Fitzgerald
"It is the incessant, continuous pressure of the herd ... to conventionalize its methods of acquiring the gratification of its needs."
From Taboo and Genetics A Study of the Biological, Sociological and Psychological Foundation of the Family by Melvin Moses Knight
It was as if she had secretly determined—God knows from what pressure of lonely sorrow—to conventionalize her life, to present the world hereafter nothing but an even surface of unobtrusive conformity.
From The Book of Susan A Novel by Lee Wilson Dodd
To the true romance the idea of marriage is at first repugnant, will not be thought about, for it seeks to square and conventionalize a great burst of the spirit.
From Hempfield A Novel by David Grayson
They're perfectly legitimate to study and they're interesting, but the reason I'm less interested in them is because they're conventionalized.
From Salon ● Jul. 8, 2023
There are displays, often conventionalized within the norms of a culture: displays of power, strength, wealth, beauty, generosity, cleverness, and social status.
From Scientific American ● Jul. 26, 2013
He becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy, the conventionalized figure of a sahib.”
From Slate ● May 18, 2013
You get a highly conventionalized narrative of golden oldies that seems both too extensive and not extensive enough.
From Time Magazine Archive
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The ornamentation is of the conventionalized plant type: gold is freely used, and enamel, of a kind different from the Roman enamel used later in Germany, is applied to weapons and ornaments.
From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 11, Slice 7 "Geoponici" to "Germany" by Various
Further, the restricted action of Rowe's play causes a conventionalizing of the characters.
From Tragedy by Ashley H. Thorndike
The modifying or conventionalizing forces are, therefore, quite vague.
From Ancient art of the province of Chiriqui, Colombia Sixth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1884-1885, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1888, pages 3-188 by William Henry Holmes
The Arundel Society have published some meritorious plates of this kind from Angelico,—not, however, paying respect enough to the local colors, but conventionalizing the whole too much into outline.
From Ariadne Florentina Six Lectures on Wood and Metal Engraving by John Ruskin
As to what Davidson might have become under the conventionalizing influences of an official position, it would be idle to speculate.
From Memories and Studies by Henry James
This justifies the habit of conventionalizing natural forms, and the tendency of some kinds of hieratic art, like the Byzantine or Egyptian, to affect a rigid symmetry of posture.
From The Sense of Beauty Being the Outlines of Aesthetic Theory by George Santayana
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.