urbanize

[ur-buh-nahyz]

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verb (used with object), ur·ban·ized, ur·ban·iz·ing.

to make or cause to become urban, as a locality.

Also especially British, ur·ban·ise.

Origin of urbanize

First recorded in 1635–45; urban + -ize

Related formsur·ban·i·za·tion, nounnon·ur·ban·ized, adjectiveo·ver·ur·ban·ize, verb, o·ver·ur·ban·ized, o·ver·ur·ban·iz·ing.un·ur·ban·ized, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Related Words for urbanized

sophisticate, metropolitanize

Examples from the Web for urbanized

Contemporary Examples of urbanized

In the large cities the urbanized working class were slaves to a plutocracy.
How Dickens and Scrooge Saved Christmas
Clive Irving
December 22, 2014
Israel and Palestine—it cannot be stressed enough—exist in a globalized, networked, densely populated, urbanized land.
Israelis and Palestinians: Getting Down To Business
Bernard Avishai
June 24, 2013
The Democrats dominate the urbanized coasts and the industrial Midwest.
Starbucks’ Effort to Solve the Fiscal Cliff Probably Won’t Work
Daniel Gross
December 26, 2012
He has food stamps and soup kitchens that provide him enough to eat, as do most homeless people in most urbanized areas.
Officer’s Gift to ‘Homeless’ Man Triggers Controversy
Winston Ross
December 7, 2012
Millions of refugees were inundating the several hundred square kilometers of urbanized coastline.
The Extinction Parade: An Original Zombie Story by Max Brooks
Max Brooks
January 14, 2011

Historical Examples of urbanized

Their minds have been urbanized; all their thoughts are city thoughts.
Rural Life and the Rural School
Joseph Kennedy
Europe was transformed from an agricultural to an urbanized, industrial area.
The Rising Tide of Color Against White World-Supremacy
Theodore Lothrop Stoddard

British Dictionary definitions for urbanized

urbanize

urbanise

verb (tr)

(usually passive)

to make (esp a predominantly rural area or country) more industrialized and urban
to cause the migration of an increasing proportion of (rural dwellers) into cities

Derived Formsurbanization or urbanisation, noun

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for urbanized

urbanize

1640s, "to make more civil;" 1884 "to make into a city," from urban + -ize; in the latter sense from French urbaniser (1873). Related: Urbanized; urbanizing.