dislocation

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. The act or process of dislocating or the state of having been dislocated: "the severe emotional dislocation experienced by millions of immigrants . . . who were forced to separate themselves forever from the . . . circle of people and places on which they had depended” ( Doris Kearns Goodwin).
2. n. Displacement of a body part, especially the temporary displacement of a bone from its normal position.
3. n. Chemistry An imperfection in the crystal structure of a metal or other solid resulting from an absence of an atom or atoms in one or more layers of a crystal.
4. n. Geology See displacement.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. Displacement; derangement or disorder of parts.
2. n. Specifically.
3. n. In surgery: The displacement or separation of the parts of a joint; the unjointing of a limb; luxation. When dislocation takes place as the result of violence, it is called primitive or accidental; and when it happens as a consequence of disease, which has destroyed the tissues forming the joint, it is called consecutive or spontaneous. A simple dislocation is a dislocation unattended by a wound communicating internally with the joint and externally with the air; and a compound dislocation is a dislocation which is attended by such a wound.
4. n. Anatomical displacement, as of an organ through disease or violence; malposition.
5. n. In geology, a break in the continuity of strata, usually attended with more or less movement of the rocks on one side or the other, so that, in following any one stratum, it will be found to be above or below the place which it would have occupied had no break or dislocation occurred. See fault.
6. n. The territorial distribution of an army.

Wiktionary

1. n. The act of displacing, or the state of being displaced.
2. n. geology The displacement of parts of rocks or portions of strata from the situation which they originally occupied. Slips, faults, and the like, are dislocations.
3. n. The act of dislocating, or putting out of joint; also, the condition of being thus displaced.
4. n. A linear defect in a crystal lattice. Because dislocations can shift within the crystal lattice, they tend to weaken the material, compared to a perfect crystal.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. The act of displacing, or the state of being displaced.
2. n. (Geol.) The displacement of parts of rocks or portions of strata from the situation which they originally occupied. Slips, faults, and the like, are dislocations.
3. n. (Surg.) The act of dislocating, or putting out of joint; also, the condition of being thus displaced.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. the act of disrupting an established order so it fails to continue
2. n. an event that results in a displacement or discontinuity
3. n. a displacement of a part (especially a bone) from its normal position (as in the shoulder or the vertebral column)