disembodied
Britishadjective
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lacking a body or freed from the body; incorporeal
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lacking in substance, solidity, or any firm relation to reality
Explanation
Something that's disembodied is disconnected from a solid form or body. If you hear a disembodied voice coming from your basement, it's spooky and ghostly, with no visible shape or form. Use the adjective disembodied to describe something that's separate from any substantial structure. A magic trick might make it appear that a disembodied head is floating in the air, and a mysterious voice or cry ringing out in the night would also seem to be disembodied. The root of disembodied is the verb embody, which had the earliest meaning of "invest a soul or spirit with a physical form."
Vocabulary lists containing disembodied
And Then There Were None
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The Chocolate War
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The Haunting of Hill House
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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.
The installation ends with two vigorous Frankenthalers from 1961 and 1977, dramas enacted by disembodied pools of luminous hues.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 28, 2026
First comes the warning, that disembodied voice over the tannoy: "Your attention please. Air siren in the city. Please move to the shelter on the minus second floor."
From BBC ● Nov. 16, 2025
It was an uncanny experience: Literal scores of people who had previously been disembodied online avatars or voices on the phone were now conjured before me in the flesh, like a resting-pulse sequel to Jumanji.
From Slate ● Sep. 21, 2025
I recoiled when the Wizard’s disembodied head loomed above.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 3, 2025
Ice-cold air hit them like an oncoming wind: Yaxley, confused, looked around for the source of the trouble and saw Harry’s disembodied hand and wand pointing at him.
From "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" by J.K. Rowling
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.
