self-invention

noun

self-in·ven·tion ˌself-in-ˈven-shən

plural self-inventions

: the act or an instance of inventing or creating one's identity or conception of oneself

her self-invention as a pop star

Bob Dylan has surpassed Walt Whitman as the defining American artist, celebrating the capacity for self-invention as the highest form of freedom.—

Cass R. Sunstein

… I've been poring online … over certain performances, interesting myself in those moments when [David] Bowie seems on the cusp of one of his celebrated self-inventions …—

Brian Dillon

Examples of self-invention in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

But that downplays her own vast resources of self-invention. —

Louisa Thomas, The New Yorker, 28 July 2024 Here, self-invention is an act of brutal violence with no discernable survivors. —

Chloe Schama, Vogue, 18 July 2024 Paris is a battered place of freedom, self-invention, cigarettes, and deep talk that springs from dark-eyed experience. —

Bart Bull, SPIN, 20 June 2023 May, at first, is one of them, posing for (pre-smartphone) flashbulb photos and fully in tune with the theatrical self-invention that infuses the club. —

Sheri Linden, The Hollywood Reporter, 22 Feb. 2023

Word History

First Known Use

1914, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler

The first known use of self-invention was in 1914

See more words from the same year

Cite this Entry

Style

“Self-invention.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/self-invention. Accessed 23 Nov. 2024.

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