Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The act of forming something into a particular shape.
  • noun A shape, form, or outline.
  • noun The act of representing with figures.
  • noun A figurative representation.
  • noun Ornamentation of a passage by embellishing and often repeating figures.
  • noun The pattern made by such embellishment or repetition.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Formation as to figure or outline; external conformation; determination to a certain form: as, the figuration of crystals.
  • noun The act or process of figuring; a shaping into form, or a marking or impressing with a figure or figures.
  • noun In music: In strict composition, such as fugue-writing, the introduction of passing-notes into the counterpoint
  • noun In general composition, the process, act, or result of rhythmically, melodically, or contrapuntally varying or elaborating a theme by adding passing-notes or accompaniment figures, or even by transforming single tones into florid passages
  • noun The preparation of a figured bass (which see. under bass).
  • noun In phillol., change in the form of words without change of sense.
  • noun Figurative representation; prefiguration.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The act of giving figure or determinate form; determination to a certain form.
  • noun (Mus.) Mixture of concords and discords.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The act of giving figure or determinate form; determination to a certain form.
  • noun Mixture of concords and discords.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun representing figuratively as by emblem or allegory
  • noun decorating with a design

Etymologies

Sorry, no etymologies found.

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Examples

  • Where the figuration is less narrative and more cogitative, that streaming montage of icons is, of course, of less import.

    Notes on Notes Hal Duncan 2009

  • Where the figuration is less narrative and more cogitative, that streaming montage of icons is, of course, of less import.

    Archive 2009-07-01 Hal Duncan 2009

  • Ultimately the subject may be so absented, suggested at the most liminal thematic level if at all, that the extended figuration is not read as metaphor at all; instead it is read as story.

    Archive 2008-08-01 Hal Duncan 2008

  • Still, if figuration is the key function of narrative, the other functions are not wholly absent.

    Archive 2008-08-01 Hal Duncan 2008

  • Still, if figuration is the key function of narrative, the other functions are not wholly absent.

    Notes on Strange Fiction: Narrative's Function (1) Hal Duncan 2008

  • And indeed, Heller's figuration is such a functional idiom that it has been taken-up, used widely by people who may have never read the book, may not even know the origin of the term.

    Notes on Strange Fiction: Narrative's Function (1) Hal Duncan 2008

  • Not all figuration is metaphoric though; in metonymy, the process of interpretation is not based on resemblances but on other forms of association -- the association of a crown with a king, for example, such that we use the artefact as a metonymic stand-in for the person.

    Notes on Strange Fiction: Narrative's Function (1) Hal Duncan 2008

  • Ultimately the subject may be so absented, suggested at the most liminal thematic level if at all, that the extended figuration is not read as metaphor at all; instead it is read as story.

    Notes on Strange Fiction: Narrative's Function (1) Hal Duncan 2008

  • And indeed, Heller's figuration is such a functional idiom that it has been taken-up, used widely by people who may have never read the book, may not even know the origin of the term.

    Archive 2008-08-01 Hal Duncan 2008

  • Not all figuration is metaphoric though; in metonymy, the process of interpretation is not based on resemblances but on other forms of association -- the association of a crown with a king, for example, such that we use the artefact as a metonymic stand-in for the person.

    Archive 2008-08-01 Hal Duncan 2008

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