self-abnegation
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of self-abnegation
First recorded in 1650–60
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.
On the contrary, sometimes it unfolds out of the public eye; self-abnegation can be a reliable marker of character.
From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 19, 2026
Where did this self-abnegation begin, and why does it persist?
From Slate • Mar. 23, 2025
To make his self-abnegation flesh, Spivey is surrounded — and serially haunted — by six sensational actors who play Usher’s “Thoughts.”
From Washington Post • Dec. 6, 2021
But her self-abnegation, far from enabling her work, frustrates the fulfillment of her artistic potential, turning her books into lifeless “intellectual exercises.”
From The New Yorker • Nov. 13, 2019
Every day at this level of life in our great city it is proved to the privileged that tenderness is the winning element in strength; that love daily, hourly here proves its power of self-abnegation.
From The Leaven in a Great City by Betts, Lillian William
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.
