liberatory
Americanadjective
Explanation
If something is liberatory, it gives you a sense of freedom and relief. If you're bored waiting for something to end so that you can go home, the signal that you can finally leave is liberatory. Liberatory comes from a Latin word liberare meaning "to set free." This is also where we get words like liberation and liberally. It can refer to something that gives literal freedom, like a clock chiming when it's time to go home, or metaphorical freedom, like a book that gives you a new perspective.
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.
Seniors are favorite characters of Ms. Williams, avatars of a spirit of liberatory indifference.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 14, 2025
This is what the real danger of both utopian and dystopian visions is: They can have a toxic effect upon our imaginations, by distracting us away from both present-day oppression and liberatory future possibilities.
From Salon ● Jul. 29, 2023
Banham’s revolutionary study has aged both well and badly; his sense of the liberatory aspect of the freeways, for instance, now seems both sentimental and benighted.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 11, 2023
And it argues its case by examining 38 other ostensibly liberatory images of Black subjects that predate and postdate this one.
From New York Times ● Mar. 10, 2022
How moments of liberation, which are often not just a moment, but nonetheless, more finite pushes that are liberatory.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 15, 2021
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.
