oppression

From Middle English oppression, from Old French oppression, from Latin oppressiō (“a pressing down, violence, oppression”), from opprimō; see oppress.

• IPA^(key): /əˈpɹɛʃən/

• Audio (US):

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• Rhymes: -ɛʃən
• Hyphenation: op‧pres‧sion

oppression (countable and uncountable, plural oppressions)

1. The exercise of authority or power in a burdensome, cruel, or unjust manner.
   • 1614, Walter Ralegh [i.e., Walter Raleigh], The Historie of the World […], London: […] William Stansby for Walter Burre, […], →OCLC, (please specify |book=1 to 5):

     Oh, by what plots, by what forswearings, betrayings, oppressions, imprisonments, tortures, poisonings, and under what reasons of state and politic subtilty, have these forenamed kings […] pulled the vengeance of God upon themselves […]

   • 2008, Nancy Pelosi, “A Voice That Will Be Heard”, in Know Your Power: A Message to America's Daughters‎^[1], Doubleday, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, pages 95–96:

     "Tibet challenges the conscience of the world," I told the audience at a gathering outside the town's main temple. "If freedom-loving people throughout the world do not speak out against China's oppression in China and Tibet, we have lost all moral authority to speak on behalf of human rights anywhere in the world."

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:oppression.
2. The act of oppressing, or the state of being oppressed.

   Extreme freedom is followed by extreme oppression, said Plato.

3. A feeling of being oppressed.

   Our oppression was lifted by the reappearance of the sun.

   • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter VII, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

     […] St. Bede's at this period of its history was perhaps the poorest and most miserable parish in the East End of London. Close-packed, crushed by the buttressed height of the railway viaduct, rendered airless by huge walls of factories, it at once banished lively interest from a stranger's mind and left only a dull oppression of the spirit.

• oppress

• “oppression”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “oppression”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

From Latin oppressiōnem.

• IPA^(key): /ɔ.pʁɛ.sjɔ̃/ ~ /ɔ.pʁe.sjɔ̃/

• Audio:

  (file)

oppression f (plural oppressions)

1. oppression
2. (Louisiana) asthma

• “oppression”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.