implosion
pronunciation
How to pronounce implosion in British English:
UK [ɪm'pləʊʒn]
How to pronounce implosion in American English:
US [ɪm'ploʊʒn]
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- Noun:
- a sudden inward collapse
- the initial occluded phase of a stop consonant
Word Origin
- implosion (n.)
- "a bursting inward," 1829, modeled on explosion, with assimilated form of in- "into, in, on, upon" (see in- (2)). And to show how entire the neglect and confusion have been, they speak in the same breath of all these explosions, and of the explosion of a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen, the result of which, instead of being a gas or an enlargement of bulk, a positive quantity, is a negative one. It is a vacuum, in a popular sense, because the produce is water. The result is an implosion (to coin a word), not an explosion .... ["Gas-light," "Westminster Review," October 1829] In early use often in reference to effect of deep sea pressures, or in phonetics. Figurative sense is by 1960.
Example
- 1. Some even predicted the media group 's implosion .
- 2. But the movement 's implosion is nevertheless astonishing .
- 3. But any is preferable to the implosion of the euro zone .
- 4. Prevent injury due to implosion of picture tubes .
- 5. The recent implosion of the conservative movement is one of the great puzzles of american political history .