e·mas·cu·late

(ĭ-măs′kyə-lāt′)

tr.v. e·mas·cu·lat·ed, e·mas·cu·lat·ing, e·mas·cu·lates

1. To castrate.

2. To deprive of strength or vigor; weaken.

adj. (-lĭt)

Deprived of virility, strength, or vigor.

[Latin ēmasculāre, ēmasculāt- : ē-, ex-, ex- + masculus, male, diminutive of mās, male, man.]

e·mas′cu·la′tion n.

e·mas′cu·la′tive, e·mas′cu·la·to′ry (-lə-tôr′ē) adj.

e·mas′cu·la′tor n.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

References in periodicals archive

In the introduction and the six chapters that follow, Filipowicz examines a cluster of plays and other performative artifacts--all important lieux de memoire or memory sites for the community of Poles--and scrutinizes approximately a dozen vital if neglected theatrical works in which female characters step out from behind normative heroic men and performe transgressive, even unprecedented roles as heroes, martyrs, or (paradoxically emasculatory) leaders of men.

Taking Liberties

Emasculatory language appears in the titles of popular books such as Germaine Greer's "The Female Eunuch" (1971), Robert Glimer's "The Sensuous Eunuch" (1972), Linda McQuaig's "The Cult of Impotence: Selling the Myth of Powerlessness in a Global Economy" (1998), and Melanie Phillips' "The Sex-Change Society: Feminised Britain and the Neutered Male" (1999).

The language of emasculation: implications for cancer patients

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