sublimate

Meanings

1. 1
   verb

   psychology: to redirect an unacceptable impulse or desire into a socially acceptable or constructive activity

   She sublimated her anger into disciplined political organizing.

2. 2
   verb

   chemistry: to change a solid directly into vapor, or cause it to do so, without passing through a liquid state

   Under low pressure, the frozen material will sublimate rather than melt.

3. 3
   verb

   to purify, refine, or elevate something into a higher form

   The poet tried to sublimate private grief into art.

4. 4
   noun

   a substance obtained or deposited through sublimation

   A white sublimate collected on the cooler wall of the vessel.

From Latin sublimare, 'to raise or elevate,' from sublimis, 'high, uplifted.' Alchemy used the word for raising a substance as vapor and collecting it in purified form. Freud adopted the figurative idea for redirecting instinctive energy into culturally valued activity.

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