Joseph ConradFrancis Cutler Marshall
What prepositions are used with assimilate?: Usage Guide
When assimilate is followed by a preposition, transitive senses 2a and 2b commonly take to and into and less frequently with; sense 2c regularly takes to; sense 3 most often takes to and sometimes with. The most frequent prepositions used with the intransitive sense are to and into.
-ˌlāt
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Linguistic assimilation?
There are a handful of words in English that are examples of themselves, representatives of the very things that they describe. One such word is sesquipedalian ("having many syllables" or "characterized by the use of long words"). Another example, in a slightly less obvious fashion, is assimilate. When used as a technical word to describe a certain process of language change, assimilate refers to the habit that some sounds have of becoming more like the sounds that are close to them in a word (see assimilation, sense 3). For instance, the original spelling of immovable in English was inmovable, and over time the n began to sound more like its neighboring m, to the point that it actually became that letter.
Something similar occurred before assimilate was a word in English. Assimilate comes from the Latin prefix ad- (meaning "to, towards") and similis ("similar"). Over time the d of the prefix ad- assimilated itself with the s of similis.
Examples of assimilate in a Sentence
Stephan Thernstrom, Times Literary Supplement, 26 May 2000
Those groups were eagerly assimilating into the larger culture and rejecting their own cuisine …
—Corby Kummer, New York Times Book Review, 16 Aug. 1998
The mistaken attempts to assimilate Lindner's paintings into the Pop Art movement in the 1960s …
—Hilton Kramer, Arts & Antiques, January 1997
Children need to assimilate new ideas.
There was a lot of information to assimilate at school.
Schools were used to assimilate the children of immigrants.
They found it hard to assimilate to American society.
Many of these religious traditions have been assimilated into the culture.
Jillian Steinhauer, New York Times, 13 Apr. 2024
Watching two generations of women try to assimilate at different stages in their lives is exciting and amusing.
—Siddhant Adlakha, Variety, 10 Mar. 2024
Indeed, to assimilate the various changes underway while remaining resilient in the face of one crisis after another, new technologies represent a significant reinforcement for companies to:
• Comply more easily with regulatory requirements.
—Dimitri Raziev, Forbes, 1 Mar. 2024
Nearly 150,000 Indigenous children were sent to the residential schools to be assimilated between the 19th century and the late 1990s.
—Leo Sands, Washington Post, 27 Feb. 2024
Organizations should also examine how their culture puts pressure on people from non-majority groups to assimilate.
—Jessica Guynn, USA TODAY, 1 Feb. 2024
However, many Irish volunteers remained, including second- and third-generation Irish, who had assimilated into American life.
—Sarah Quiñones Wolfson, Los Angeles Times, 17 Mar. 2024
Johnny Flynn plays Winton five decades earlier, a stern and quiet young man, the son of German Jewish immigrants who converted to Christianity and changed their last name in order to assimilate in England.
—Katie Walsh, San Diego Union-Tribune, 14 Mar. 2024
Public consciousness has not yet assimilated the point that technology is ideology.
—Jay Caspian Kang, The New Yorker, 8 Mar. 2024
Andrew C. McCarthy, National Review, 6 Nov. 2023
The more advanced kids in the class have quietly watched Eflin assimilate.
—Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY, 5 Apr. 2023
With deregulation in the 1980s, the focus of the training shifted to helping women and people of color assimilate into existing corporate cultures.
—Glenn Llopis, Forbes, 26 June 2021
Now, the pressure is on resident advisers and others to help the Class of 2023 assimilate.
—Nick Anderson, Washington Post, 25 Aug. 2019
According to Sessions, a good immigrant assimilates.
—Jeneé Osterheldt, kansascity, 6 Sep. 2017
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'assimilate.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Word History
Verb
Middle English assimilaten "to make similar," borrowed from Medieval Latin assimilāre, assimulāre "to make similar, digest, compare," going back to Latin, "to pretend, feign, assume the likeness of, cause to resemble, imitate, portray, liken (to)," from as- as- + similāre "to pretend, assume the appearance of by one's conduct, imitate" — more at simulate
Noun
derivative of assimilate entry 1
Verb
1671, in the meaning defined at transitive sense 1b
Noun
1935, in the meaning defined above
Dictionary Entries Near assimilate
Cite this Entry
“Assimilate.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/assimilate. Accessed 19 Apr. 2024.
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Kids Definition
assimilate
verb
Medical Definition
assimilate
1 of 2 verb
assimilate
2 of 2 noun
More from Merriam-Webster on assimilate
Nglish: Translation of assimilate for Spanish Speakers
Britannica English: Translation of assimilate for Arabic Speakers
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