erasure

English

Pronunciation

• (US) IPA^(key): /ɪˈɹeɪʃɚ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ɪˈɹeɪʒə/, /ɪˈɹeɪʒʊə/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Audio (US):

  (file)

Noun

erasure (countable and uncountable, plural erasures)

1. The action of erasing; deletion; obliteration.
   • 1817 December 31 (indicated as 1818), [Walter Scott], Rob Roy. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC:

     An inroad on the strongbox, or an erasure in the ledger, or a missummation in a fitted account, could hardly have surprised him more disagreeably.

   • 1949 June 8, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], “Chapter 7”, in Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel, London: Secker & Warburg, →OCLC; republished [Australia]: Project Gutenberg of Australia, August 2001:

     The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became truth.

2. The state of having been erased; total blankness.
   • 2004 October 18, The New Yorker:

     Bush, even when he had the floor, grimaced as he spoke, except on several occasions when he lost his way and a look of total erasure came over him, a blank, stricken stare for which the French, alas, have the most apt expression: like a cow watching a train go by.

3. The place where something has been erased.

   There were several erasures on the paper.

4. (sociology) A tendency to ignore or conceal an element of society.

   bisexual erasure

Synonyms

• (action of erasing): cancelation (US), cancellation (British), canceling (US), cancelling (British), deleting, deletion, erasing, obliterating, obliteration, wiping
• (state of having been erased): blankness

Hyponyms

• type erasure

Derived terms

• bi-erasure
• erasure code
• trans-erasure
• under erasure

 

Translations

action of erasing

• Bulgarian: изтриване (bg) n (iztrivane), заличаване (bg) n (zaličavane)
• Indonesian: penghapusan (id)
• Latin: litūra f
• Portuguese: apagamento (pt) m
• Russian: стира́ние (ru) n (stiránije)
• Tagalog: pagbura
• Walloon: disfaçaedje (wa) m

state of having been erased

• Tagalog: bura, bura-bura

References

• erasure on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Latin

Participle

ērāsūre

1. vocative masculine singular of ērāsūrus