assimilation

Noun

assimilation (countable and uncountable, plural assimilations)

1. The act of assimilating or the state of being assimilated.
   • --France swarms with Gracchus's and Publicolas, who by imaginary assimilations of acts, which a change of manners has rendered different, fancy themselves more than equal to their prototypes.1797, An English Lady, A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795
   • His work generally is full of assimilations and quotations from art that is not Mexican, and he's said, "Nationalism has nothing to do with my work.1996 January 26, Bertha Husband, “Double Identity”, in Chicago Reader
2. The metabolic conversion of nutrients into tissue.
   • We have great need to be careful in these assimilations; some kinds of food are rich but not easily digested.1908, Washington Gladden, The Church and Modern Life
3. (broadly) The absorption of new ideas into an existing cognitive structure.
4. A sound change process by which the phonetics of a speech segment becomes more like that of another segment in a word (or at a word boundary), so that a change of phoneme occurs.
   • Hence, rather than being the result of mishearing and assimilation, the application of Hobson-Jobson to the Muharram was intentionally disparaging.2014, James Lambert, “A Much Tortured Expression: A New Look At `Hobson-Jobson'”, in International Journal of Lexicography, volume 27, number 1, page 59
5. (cultural studies) The adoption, by a minority group, of the customs and attitudes of the dominant culture.
   • After centuries of British cultural assimilation, a majority of Irish now speak English instead of Irish.
   • Assimilation was one of the words they used for Indians becoming white in order to survive, in order that they might not be killed for being Indians.2024, Tommy Orange, Wandering Stars, Harvill Secker, page 55