Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun The property of being rootless.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • While there's a certain rootlessness and solitude to nomadism, I suppose that I am, as my father asserts, fundamentally a Bedouin.

    Diana Abu-Jaber biography 2007

  • Delphine is searching as much for a new homeland as a husband—her motives for marrying Joseph are a complicated blend of love and the desire for a green card—but, as an actor friend named William says, her rootlessness is a universal condition in the city: No one in New York has parents.

    Rootless Urban Transplants Sam Sacks 2011

  • The proper response is to note that in your seminal article on the phenomenon, you cited Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, founder of the liberal blog Daily Kos, as the definitional example of a blogofascist, pointing out his "rootlessness" and his three-year hitch in the US Army as proof of the essentially fascistic nature of his personality.

    Archive 2007-12-01 Johnny Pez 2007

  • The proper response is to note that in your seminal article on the phenomenon, you cited Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, founder of the liberal blog Daily Kos, as the definitional example of a blogofascist, pointing out his "rootlessness" and his three-year hitch in the US Army as proof of the essentially fascistic nature of his personality.

    To Lee Siegel: A Modest Proposal Johnny Pez 2007

  • The distinction between "city" and "suburb" thus dissolved, people find themselves lost in what might as well be an alien landscape . . . foreign not because of any sense of unfamiliarity, but because of sheer directionless uniformity, the kind of rootlessness one experiences pondering an M.C.

    Archive 2006-03-01 Mac 2006

  • Charles Taylor contemplates "rootlessness," his fellow Salon

    GreenCine Daily 2009

  • A feeling of "rootlessness" took over among the tribe members, and so did diabetes.

    Arbiter Online 2009

  • Charles Taylor contemplates "rootlessness," his fellow Salon

    GreenCine Daily 2009

  • Speaking specifically of radical Muslim youth, Cameron argued this resulted in marginalization, rootlessness, and "behaving in ways that run completely counter to our values."

    Homa Sabet Tavangar: How to Save Multiculturalism Homa Sabet Tavangar 2011

  • Authors' tributes: 'His great theme was the moral rootlessness of American life'

    Books in 2011 – from the new Alan Hollinghurst to David Foster Wallace's unfinished The Pale King 2011

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