ineradicable
Americanadjective
adjective
Other Word Forms
- ineradicableness noun
- ineradicably adverb
Etymology
Origin of ineradicable
First recorded in 1810–20; in- 3 + eradicable
Explanation
When it's impossible to change or eliminate something, it's ineradicable. Unfortunately, your dad's ineradicable dislike of furry animals means you'll have to wait until you have a place of your own to get that dog you dream of. The adjective ineradicable comes from eradicate, which means "totally destroy," and the prefix in-, "opposite of." So when something's ineradicable, whether it's a quality like hostility or a situation like inequality, there's just no way to destroy it. Though negative things are most often described as ineradicable, you can also praise your friend's ineradicable optimism or admire your teacher's ineradicable enthusiasm.
Vocabulary lists containing ineradicable
Nickel and Dimed
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"Anne Frank: The Book, The Life, The Afterlife," Vocabulary from the literary criticism
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"Anne Frank: The Book, the Life, the Afterlife" by Francine Prose
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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.
Social media can efficiently make any lunatic theory an ineradicable and ever-evolving virus.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 9, 2026
These include Richard Kind as an Arconia resident with a supposedly ineradicable migrating case of pink eye and Kumail Nanjiani as his neighbor, whose apartment is crowded with Christmas decorations year round.
From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 27, 2024
How should millennial, liberal democracies balance legitimate national pride with an ineradicable legacy of wrongs done to indigenous peoples?
From Washington Times • Jan. 26, 2023
After all my reporting, I am still pondering the seemingly ineradicable tension between the desire for inclusion and the biological reasons we established sporting leagues for men and women in the first place.
From Washington Post • Feb. 24, 2022
He was a blustering, intrepid bully who brooded inconsolably over the terrible ineradicable impressions he knew he kept making on people of prominence who were scarcely aware that he was even alive.
From "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller
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.
