Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use obliterative in a sentence

14 example sentences · adjective

Obliterative means tending or serving to obliterate. Example: “The obliterative stage is a natural process of erasing old facts, which frees the mind for new things.”

Examples of obliterative by meaning

adjectiveTending or serving to obliterate.

  • The obliterative stage is a natural process of erasing old facts, which frees the mind for new things.1977, Samuel N. Postlethwait, Exploring Teaching Alternatives, page 10
  • Applying conventional obliterative paint over graffiti is undesirable for several reasons.1992, M. J. Whitford, Getting Rid of Graffiti, page 108
  • The transaction is not one of indifference to sin, or obliterative of the distinction between righteousness and unrighteousness.2015, Horatius Bonar, edited by Terry Kulakowski, The Everlasting Righteousness, page 47

adjectiveTending or serving to hide or deny.

  • This is undoubtedly true as a statement of the coloration, but whether this coloration is in fact obliterative needs further investigation.1910, Theodore Roosevelt, African game trails, page 557
  • The obliterative method of reaction seemed to be the most personally satisfying reaction, since more in this group had adequate social adjustments, and derived pleasure from their activities.1942, Carney Landis, Mary Marjorie Bolles, Personality and Sexuality of the Physically Handicapped Woman, page 88

adjectiveCausing a passageway to become completely closed off.

  • In the case of true obliterative appendicitis, however, the opposed surfaces of the lumen have become firmly united to each other, and the obliterating band is absolutely impervious.1900, John Blair Deaver, A Treatise on Appendicitis, page 89
  • Although generally obstructive, obliterative changes may lead to non- or poorly communicating airspaces, which will not be obvious on spirometry.2007, William N. Rom, Steven B. Markowitz, Environmental and Occupational Medicine

More sentences with obliterative

  • We have here, as far as these patterns go, a complete inversion of the regular obliterative coloration.1909, Gerald Handerson Thayer, Concealing-coloration in the Animal Kingdom, page 147. From the entry obliterative coloration
  • There is a difference between obliterative subsumption that may occur after meaningful learning and forgetting that occurs after rote learning.2022, Joseph D. Novak, Helping People Learn. From the entry obliterative subsumption
  • Obliterative coloration aims to make animals invisible, while mimicry is deceptive visibility aiming to make the animal appear as something else.2011, Matthew Brower, Developing Animals: Wildlife and Early American Photography, page 230. From the entry obliterative coloration
  • There is doubtless something in this theory of obliterative coloration.1909, Douglas Dewar, Frank Finn, The Making of Species, page 187. From the entry obliterative colouration
  • Forgetting occurs, according to Ausubel, where there is zero dissociability (or obliterative subsumption ) because new learning cannot be distinguished from the old .2001, Grahame Hill, A Level Psychology Through Diagrams, page 241. From the entry obliterative subsumption
  • The forgetting of knowledge or obliterative assimilation may be viewed as the gradual and spontaneous dissolution of new ideas from their anchoring ideas.1970, Robert Stone Newsom, The Assimilation and Retention of Hierarchically Structured Prose Materials, page 15. From the entry obliterative assimilation
  • We cannot continue simply to assume a humanistic paternalistic empathy with the suffering of "Others" that Hartman characterises as the "obliterative assimilation of empathy" which quickly becomes self-indulgent.2020, Elahe Haschemi Yekani, Familial Feeling, page 274. From the entry obliterative assimilation

Meaning of obliterative

  1. adjective Tending or serving to obliterate.
  2. adjective Tending or serving to hide or deny.
  3. adjective Causing a passageway to become completely closed off.

Full definition of obliterative

Questions about obliterative in a sentence

How do you use obliterative in a sentence?
Obliterative is used as an adjective. For example: “The obliterative stage is a natural process of erasing old facts, which frees the mind for new things.”
What is a short sentence with obliterative?
“There is doubtless something in this theory of obliterative coloration.”
What does obliterative mean?
Obliterative means tending or serving to obliterate.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: obliterative (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this page: “How to use obliterative in a sentence.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sentences/obliterative. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.