abjection

From Middle English abjeccioun, from either Middle French abjection or Late Latin abiectiōn-, from Latin abiectus (“cast down”).^[1][2]

• See abject.

• IPA^(key): /æbˈd͡ʒɛk.ʃn̩/

• Audio:

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abjection (countable and uncountable, plural abjections)

1. A low or downcast condition; meanness of spirit; abasement; degradation. [First attested from around (1350 to 1470).]^[2]

   an abjection from the beatific regions where God, and his angels and saints, dwell forever

2. (obsolete, chiefly figuratively) Something cast off; garbage. [Attested from around (1350 to 1470) until the mid 16^th century.]^[2]
3. (obsolete) The act of bringing down or humbling; casting down. [Attested from the early 16^th century until the mid 17^th century.]^[2]

   The abjection of the king and his realm.

4. (obsolete) The act of casting off; rejection. [Attested from the early 17^th century until the mid 17^th century.]^[2]
5. (sociology) The fact of being marginalized as deviant.
   • 2009 September 10, W. C. Harris, Queer Externalities: Hazardous Encounters in American Culture, SUNY Press, →ISBN, page 98:

     The disclosure of tolerance's hidden phobic lining fits in well with queer theory's embrace of the abject as exhorted by Michael Warner, David Halperin, and Lee Edelman. Embracing difference or culturally ascribed abjection with the aim of overcoming or dissipating it would be both naive and ineffective.

6. (biology, mycology) The act of dispersing or casting off spores.

From Latin abiectiōnem.

• IPA^(key): /ab.ʒɛk.sjɔ̃/

• Audio:

  (file)

abjection f (plural abjections)

1. (literary) something that is worthy of utter contempt

• abject

• “abjection”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.