impersonal

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   having no personal preference

   impersonal criticism

2. 2
   adj

   not relating to or responsive to individual persons

   an impersonal corporation

3. 3
   adj

   Not personal; not representing a person; not having personality.

   The great tragedians of Greece reveal to us their people's exquisite sense of beauty, and their faith in an awful, an almighty, but an impersonal power, called Fate

4. 4
   adj

   Lacking warmth or emotion; cold.

   She sounded impersonal as she gave her report of the Nazi death camps.

5. 5
   adj

   Not having a subject, or having a third person pronoun without an antecedent.

   The verb “rain” is impersonal in sentences like “It’s raining.”

6. 6
   noun

   An impersonal word or construct.

Etymology

From French impersonnel, from Latin impersōnālis, from im- (“not”) + persōnālis (“personal”), equivalent to im- + personal.