modernism

noun mod·ern·ism \ ˈmä-dər-ˌni-zəm \

|Updated on: 13 Jul 2018

Definition of modernism

1 : a practice, usage, or expression peculiar to modern times

such modernisms as "blog," "bromance," and "steampunk"

2 often capitalized : a tendency in theology to accommodate traditional religious teaching to contemporary thought and especially to devalue supernatural elements

3 : modern artistic or literary philosophy and practice; especially : a self-conscious break with the past and a search for new forms of expression

extols the … modernism that laid the foundation of all twentieth-century design
—Jeffrey Simpson

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modernist

play \-nist\ noun or adjective

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modernistic

play \ˌmä-dər-ˈnis-tik\ adjective

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Recent Examples of modernism from the Web

Anchoring the work are the re-creations of Vaslav Nijinsky’s dancing and choreographic milestones, all of which both absorbed the 19th century’s classical style and foreshadowed the modernism that prevailed for most of the 20th century.

— allan ulrich, San Francisco Chronicle, "As S.F. Ballet readies for festival, Canadian company gives its all in ‘Nijinsky’," 4 Apr. 2018
Featuring a foreword by Los Angeles fashion designer Trina Turk, whose Palm Springs home, the Ship of the Desert, is also showcased, the inspiring coffee table tome is a love letter to modernism.

— bonnie mccarthy, latimes.com, "'Palm Springs: A Modernist Paradise': A love letter to modernism," 9 Feb. 2018
The story of modernism’s debt to non-Western, folk and tribal art is complex and only getting more so.

— roberta smith and martha schwendener, New York Times, "What to See in New York Art Galleries This Week," 10 Jan. 2018
There are eight venues smattered across the small, green city: pre-war Art Nouveau buildings, relics of Soviet modernism, the train station at seaside resort town Jurmala.

— laura bannister, Vogue, "Where to Go in Riga, Latvia, the New Arts Hub of the Baltic," 17 June 2018
The subtitle is no overstatement: In the early 1920s, first in Paris and then back home in São Paulo, Brazil, this painter really did lay the groundwork for the coming of modernism in Latin America’s most populous nation.

— New York Times, "19 Art Exhibitions to View in N.Y.C. This Weekend," 31 May 2018
Their catenaries hug the curves in Sheree Hovsepian’s photograms, layered with stretches of arced pantyhose in what might be called femme modernism.

— lori waxman, chicagotribune.com, "Abstraction, explained," 31 May 2018
But Roth was too moralistic, too observant at the high altar of modernism, too prissy to get into the funk and gunk of true swingdom.

— james wolcott, Vanities, "The Joy of Reading Philip Roth, Riffer, Rhetorical Flamethrower, Super-Monologuist," 24 May 2018
Literary fiction, under the sign of modernism, became too obsessed with experimentation and wordplay, while journalism, under the imperative of objectivity, adopted an arid view from nowhere.

— jeet heer, The New Republic, "Tom Wolfe reunited journalism with literature.," 15 May 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'modernism.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.