submersion

[suhb-mur-zhuhn, -shuhn]

noun

1. the act of putting oneself or another person or thing under water or into some other enveloping medium.

   Swimmers in the class are taught submersion and breath holding, floating, and kicking.

   This durable tile is specially made to withstand submersion in swimming pools.

2. the act of subordinating or suppressing something.

   Critics talked about the film’s submersion of individual character within a vision of group solidarity.

Word History and Origins

Origin of submersion¹

First recorded in 1400–50; from Late Latin submersiōn-, stem of submersiō, also summersiō “a sinking,” from Latin submers(us) “sunk” (past participle of submergere “to dip under, immerse, sink”) + -iō -ion ( def. )

Example Sentences

The primitive submarine, which held enough air for about a thirty-minute submersion, was about seven feet long and about six feet tall.

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What I miss most is closing my eyes at night, then opening them and it’s morning, that total submersion, yesterday’s problems wiped away like algebraic equations on a junior-high blackboard.

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“I Saw the TV Glow” captures this obsessive, anticipatory submersion in a long-form weekly TV show, to the point where it ignites the same feeling.

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"Drowning contributes due to the likelihood of submersion into the pool as he lapsed into unconsciousness; coronary artery disease contributes due to exacerbation of ketamine induced myocardial effects on the heart."

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Driver describes working with Mann as a submersion into technical mastery, though not without its moments of invention.

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Related Words

• deluge 
• flash flood 
• overabundance 
• torrent