amelioration

See also: amélioration

English

Alternative forms

• melioration (archaic)

Etymology

From French amélioration.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /əˌmiːliəˈɹeɪʃən/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -eɪʃən

Noun

Examples (linguistics)
Middle English nyce (“foolish”) → English nice (“kind”)

amelioration (countable and uncountable, plural ameliorations)

1. The act of making better.

   Antonym: deterioration

   • 1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XXXII, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume III, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 262:

     The tumult was over, and all things returned to their old place; and the abuse remained without remedy, and the wrong without redress. Ah! if the doctrine of amelioration be true, what a mighty debt does the future owe to the past!

2. An improvement.

   Synonym: revamp

4. (linguistics) The process by which a term gains a more positive connotation over time.

   Antonym: pejoration

5. (philosophy) An ameliorative change of a concept or a repertoire of concepts.

   pre-amelioration

   post-amelioration

Translations

act of making better

• Bulgarian: подобряване (bg) (podobrjavane)
• Catalan: millora (ca) f
• Danish: forbedre (da)
• Galician: mellora (gl) f, melloría f, melloramento (gl) m
• German: Verbesserung (de) f, Besserung (de) f
• Italian: miglioria (it) f
• Japanese: 改良 (ja) (kairyō)
• Polish: amelioracja f (dated), ulepszenie (pl) n
• Portuguese: melhoramento (pt) m
• Romanian: ameliorare (ro) f, îmbunătățire (ro) f
• Serbo-Croatian: amelioracija (sh) f
• Spanish: mejoría (es) f, mejora (es) f, mejoramiento m
• Swedish: förbättring (sv)
• Yiddish: פֿאַרבעסערונג f (farbeserung)

improvement

• Bulgarian: подобрение (bg) (podobrenie)
• Danish: forbedring (da)
• French: amélioration (fr) f
• German: Melioration (de) f, Verbesserung (de) f, Besserung (de) f (medicine)
• Italian: miglioramento (it) m
• Latin: meliōrātiō f
• Portuguese: melhora (pt) f, melhoria (pt) f
• Serbo-Croatian: amelioracija (sh) f, melioracija (sh) f
• Spanish: mejora (es) f
• Swedish: förbättring (sv)
• Yiddish: פֿאַרבעסערונג f (farbeserung), תּיקון m (tikn)

process in which a term gains a more positive connotation over time

• Serbo-Croatian: melioracija (sh) f