reify

verb re·ify \ ˈrā-ə-ˌfī , ˈrē- \

|Updated on: 13 Jul 2018

Definition of reify

reified; reifying

: to consider or represent (something abstract) as a material or concrete thing : to give definite content and form to (a concept or idea)

… the diversity rationale also insultingly assumes that black students bring a black "point of view," Asians an Asian one and so on, thus reifying the very barriers of race and ethnicity that affirmative action is meant to erase.
—James Traub

reify was our Word of the Day on 04/07/2018. Hear the podcast!

Recent Examples of reify from the Web

With so many stories of mean-spirited and violent segregationists abusing black women and men, rarely did Lewis or Odum or progressives nationwide have to confront how their liberal reforms reified racial inequities.

— Longreads, "Nell Battle Lewis, Storyteller for Jim Crow," 25 May 2018
Going forward, how can pharmaceutical companies avoid reifying societal biases and, as a result, undermining the public health effectiveness of their products?

— ashley andreou, STAT, "New Gardasil ad campaign gets it (mostly) right. It shouldn’t have taken a decade," 18 June 2018
This work connected her to nationwide efforts that rooted reform in social science research and simultaneously reified an American racial hierarchy.

— Longreads, "Nell Battle Lewis, Storyteller for Jim Crow," 25 May 2018
In addition to a stable of political allies who would likely agree with him, the president also enjoys a mostly pliant Republican establishment that’s unwilling to rein him in and a powerful media apparatus that reifies his every decision.

— matt ford, The New Republic, "When the President Defies the Supreme Court," 24 Apr. 2018
But whether this is best addressed by further reifying racial categories and concepts of citizenship is another matter.

— garry rodan, WSJ, "Singapore’s Uncontested President," 14 Sep. 2017
These words that reify concepts are a cognitive tool.

— lorraine boissoneault, Smithsonian, "How Humans Invented Numbers—And How Numbers Reshaped Our World," 13 Mar. 2017
Like a fine wine, Walla Walla sweets reify their terroir; their sweetness comes from a low amount of sulfur in the soil of the region (which also happens to produce fine wine).

— bethany jean clement, The Seattle Times, "What’s so great about Walla Walla sweet onions?," 7 June 2017
But Cohen certainly goes across the street and around the corner to reify certain stereotypes about hedge fund managers.

— jennifer senior, New York Times, "Review: ‘Black Edge,’ an Account of a Hedge Fund Magnate and Insider Trading," 1 Feb. 2017

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

Did You Know?

Reify is a word that attempts to provide a bridge between what is abstract and what is real. Fittingly, it derives from a word that is an ancestor to "real" - the Latin noun res, meaning "thing." Both "reify" and the related noun "reification" first appeared in English in the mid-19th century, though "reification" is a few years older and some dictionaries consider "reify" to be a back-formation of the noun. In general use, the words refer to the act of considering or presenting an abstract idea in real or material terms, or of judging something by a concrete example.