imaginal

[ih-mey-guh-nl, ih-mah-]

adjective

Entomology.

1. of, relating to, or having the form of an imago.

imaginal

/ ɪˈmædʒɪnəl /

adjective

1. of, relating to, or resembling an imago

2. of or relating to an image

Word History and Origins

Origin of imaginal¹

1875–80; < New Latin imāgin-, stem of imāgō imago + -al ¹

Example Sentences

All that was now dissolving, back into imaginal discs of emotion.

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“Whether to downplay it or try to defend it in some way. He identified as gay, but I never knew him to have a sexual partner, or an actual sex life. His sexual practices were what I call Whitmanesque, imaginal only.”

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As roots reggae’s foremost producer, Perry, wrote essayist and musician David Toop, built “an imaginal chamber over which presided the electronic wizard, evangelist, gossip columnist and Dr. Frankenstein.”

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Within this living soup are the imaginal cells that will catalyse its transformation into winged maturity.

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May the best among us, the most visionary, the most inclusive, be the imaginal cells – for now we are in the soup.

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