elaboration

American  

[ih-lab-uh-rey-shuhn] / ɪˌlæb əˈreɪ ʃən /

noun

1. an act or instance of elaborating.

2. the state of being elaborated; elaborateness.

3. something that is elaborated.

4. Psychiatry. an unconscious process of expanding and embellishing a detail, especially while recalling and describing a representation in a dream so that latent content of the dream is brought into a logical and comprehensible order.

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Other Word Forms

• self-elaboration noun

Etymology

Origin of elaboration

First recorded in 1570–80; from Latin ēlabōrātiōn-, stem of ēlabōrātiō, from ēlabōrāt(us) “worked out” (past participle of ēlabōrāre “to work out, produce through labor”; elaborate ) + -iō -ion

Example Sentences

Thomas Crow’s “Murder in the Rue Marat” is a granular account of the making of a masterpiece and a personal elaboration on its afterlife.

From The Wall Street Journal

“We want it back,” he said without further elaboration.

From Los Angeles Times

Lilly did not respond to a request for elaboration on the point.

From Barron's

It does not seek the new, but demands endless repetition of the same themes, merely with greater elaboration, gaudier technical effects and greater expense.

From Salon

Here repeated rhythms are overlayed by a large ensemble featuring all the festival performers in ecstatic elaborations.

From Los Angeles Times

Related Words

• amplification