formalism
noun
strict adherence to, or observance of, prescribed or traditional forms, as in music, poetry, and art.
formalist
-
a word derived from
formalism.
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.
She is, the argument goes, a poet for the moms and the mushy-hearted, for readers with no formalist inclinations, for those more interested in enjoyment than enjambment.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 2, 2026
In the 51-page, partially redacted document, Sir Peter said Harry's lawyers had taken "an inappropriate, formalist interpretation of the Ravec process".
From BBC ● Feb. 28, 2024
Aster may ultimately be too much the formalist control freak to achieve the crazy, let-it-all-hang-out catharsis he’s chasing, and the elaborate trap he’s engineered for Beau seems to close, finally, on himself.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 14, 2023
At the opposite end of the accessibility spectrum, there’s the severe German formalist Angela Schanelec’s “Music,” a beautifully composed but extraordinarily opaque riff on Sophocles’ “Oedipus Rex.”
From New York Times ● Feb. 24, 2023
Though the people came to his side at one crisis, they rejected him at others and fell back on their formalist teachers, and the prophets of a careless optimism.
From Jeremiah : Being The Baird Lecture for 1922 by Sir George Adam Smith
