denaturalize
Americanverb (used with object)
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to deprive of proper or true nature; make unnatural.
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to deprive of the rights and privileges of citizenship or of naturalization.
verb
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to deprive of nationality
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to make unnatural
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of denaturalize
First recorded in 1790–1800; de- + naturalize
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:
The federal government has to meet a high burden of proof when attempting to denaturalize a citizen, plus it can only proceed by a judicial order.
From Slate ● Apr. 16, 2025
As attorney general, Mr. Civiletti successfully argued before the Supreme Court for the government’s right to denaturalize Nazi war criminals.
From New York Times ● Oct. 17, 2022
What I want to do by putting “the Internet” in quotation marks is to denaturalize some of the assumptions we make for granted—for those assumptions have consequences.
From Slate ● Apr. 3, 2013
Demjanjuk's legal troubles began in 1977, when the Government initiated a proceeding to denaturalize him.
From Time ● Mar. 22, 2012
The latter wished to denaturalize themselves, and become as though they were foreigners even on their native soil; the former remained firm and faithful to their country and to each other.
From Holland The History of the Netherlands by Grattan, Thomas Colley
Influencers and commenters piled on, asking why, if the situation was so dire, no one had been arrested, deported or denaturalized.
From Salon ● Dec. 29, 2025
He included in the post a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi demanding that Mamdani be deported and potentially denaturalized.
From Slate ● Jul. 7, 2025
The anarchist Emma Goldman was denaturalized in 1909, and shipped to Revolutionary Russia a decade later.
From New York Times ● Jul. 30, 2020
Some were German citizens; others fled to Germany before they were denaturalized in the United States.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 16, 2017
The wretches were ashamed of their own nature, and perhaps with reason; for in their own denaturalized hearts they read only a degraded nature.
From Note Book of an English Opium-Eater by De Quincey, Thomas
You’ve said that part of what you’re doing in the class is denaturalizing what we take for granted.
From Slate ● May 27, 2026
The extraordinary process of denaturalizing an American citizen has occurred very rarely, with the Justice Department filing an estimated 300 civil denaturalization cases since 1990.
From Slate ● Jun. 11, 2018
Such is the effect of time, and communication among nations, that the mixture with an heterogenous language has not only an influence upon roots, but most frequently ends by modifying and denaturalizing grammatical forms.
From Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, During the Year 1799-1804 — Volume 2 by Humboldt, Alexander von
There could hardly be a more effective method for degrading his manhood and denaturalizing his family.
From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 5, Slice 8 "Chariot" to "Chatelaine" by Various
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.
