progressive

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   advancing in severity

   progressive paralysis

2. 2
   adj

   (of a card game or a dance) involving a series of sections for which the participants successively change place or relative position

   progressive euchre

3. 3
   adj

   favoring or promoting progress

   progressive schools

4. 4
   adj

   of taxes, adjusted so that the rate increases as the amount of income increases

   The legislator believed that progressive taxation was the fairest way to distribute the costs of society.

5. 5
   adj

   Promoting or favoring progress towards improved conditions or new policies, ideas, or methods.

   a progressive politician

6. 6
   adj

   Liberal.

   Conservative movements were far more progressive than the standard religious narrative of the decade alleges and the notoriously progressive ethos of the era was far more conservative than our collective memory has recognized.

7. 7
   adj

   Of or relating to progressive education.

   a progressive school

8. 8
   adj

   Advancing in severity.

   progressive paralysis

Etymology

From the Middle French progressif, from the Latin prōgressīvus, from prōgredior (perfect participial stem: prōgress-) + -īvus. Displaced native Old English forþgenġe. By surface analysis, progress + -ive.