Word.ws English Dictionary

mimetic desire

mimetic desire noun: a desire that is imitative, and not related to the desired object's intrinsic value, based on the idea that human desires arise from imitation and competitive behavior in groups.

Noun

mimetic desire (countable and uncountable, plural mimetic desires)

  1. A desire that is imitative, and not related to the desired object's intrinsic value, based on the idea that human desires arise from imitation and competitive behavior in groups.
    • Having transcended his own mimetic desires, [Peter] Thiel was now free to capitalise on those of others.2025 May 10, Orlando Reade, “The deification of René Girard”, in FT Weekend (Life & Arts section), London: The Financial Times Ltd., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 17

Forms of mimetic desire

pluralmimetic desires

Origin of mimetic desire

Coined by French historian, literary critic, and philosopher of social science René Girard in 1961.

Questions about mimetic desire

What does mimetic desire mean?
Mimetic desire means a desire that is imitative, and not related to the desired object's intrinsic value, based on the idea that human desires arise from imitation and competitive behavior in groups.
What part of speech is mimetic desire?
Mimetic desire is a noun.
What is the plural of mimetic desire?
The plural of mimetic desire is mimetic desires.

Words near mimetic desire in the dictionary

  1. mimestry
  2. mimetene
  3. mimetese
  4. mimetesite
  5. mimetic
  6. mimetic desire
  7. mimetic desires
  8. mimetical
  9. mimetically
  10. mimeticism
  11. mimeticisms

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: mimetic desire (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “mimetic desire.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/mimetic_desire. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.