abjection

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“
But his love of me is wonderful; I go further: I, who sicken and freeze at the mere thought of him, when I recall the abjection and passion of this attachment, and when I know how he fears my power to cut him off by suicide, I find it in my heart to pity him.

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Definitions (5)

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  1. The act of casting away or down; the act of humbling or abasing; abasement. The audacite and bolde speche of Daniel signifyeth the abjection of the kynge and his realme. Joye, Exp. of Daniel, ch. v.
  2. The state of being cast down or away; hence, a low state; meanness of spirit; baseness; groveling humility; abjectness. That this should be termed baseness, abjection of mind, or servility, is it credible? Hooker, Eccl. Pol., v. § 47. Contempt for his abjection at the foul feet of the Church. Swinburne, Shakespeare, p. 80.
  3. Rejection; expulsion. Calvin understands by Christ's descending into hell, that he suffered in his soul … all the torments of hell, even to abjection from God's presence. Heylin, Hist. of Presbyterians, p. 350.

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Examples (50)

  • They splashed ink in their nervous abjection, though not on Glinda in her celestial blue gown. —  SON OF A WITCH
  • “It is a novelty surprising enough to find a very unpolished French book translated into the most elegant Latin ever met with.” M. de Bresche declares that he was no longer able to leave so beautiful a work in such “abjection,” and had added a translation which preserves the purity of the French tongue, and is proportioned to the merit of the exquisite Latin expressions. —  George Washington's Rules of Civility
  • In early stories, abjection was most often the thing that climbed to the surface. —  Village Voice - The most recent 10 stories
  • In this book, I rely on theories of shame and "abjection" developed in the texts of Genet and Jouhandeau to attempt to think about the process of the making of the minority subject, so I came across Sedgwick's thought that came after her 1990 book: she had in fact published a superb article on the sense of shame, which she described as —  Upping the Anti - A Journal of Theory and Action
  • In this book, I rely on theories of shame and "abjection" developed in the texts of Genet and Jouhandeau to attempt to think about the process of the making of the minority subject, so I came across Sedgwick's thought that came after her 1990 book: she had in fact published a superb article on the sense of shame, which she described as "transformational energy." —  MRZine.org
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This word has been looked up 49 times.

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Etymologies (1)

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. from Middle English abjeccioun, from Old French abjection, from Latin abjectio(n-), act of casting away, from abicere, abjicere: see abject, adjective
 

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