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impersonal

[im-pur-suh-nl]

Example Sentences Origin

adjective

not personal; without reference or connection to a particular person: an impersonal remark.

having no personality; devoid of human character or traits: an impersonal deity.

lacking human emotion or warmth: an impersonal manner.

Grammar.

(of a verb) having only third person singular forms and rarely if ever accompanied by an expressed subject, as Latin pluit “it is raining,” or regularly accompanied by an empty subject word, as English to rain in It is raining.

(of a pronoun or pronominal reference) indefinite, as French on “one.”

noun

Grammar. an impersonal verb or pronoun.

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Impersonal is always a great word to know.

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a character or symbol (&) for and

a mark (‸) made in written or printed matter to show the place where something is to be inserted.

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Origin:
1510–20; < Late Latin impersōnālis. See im-², personal

Related forms

im·per·son·al·ly, adverb

su·per·im·per·son·al, adjective

su·per·im·per·son·al·ly, adverb

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Link To impersonal

Example Sentences

There seem to be several varieties, ranging from the completely impersonal to the utterly vindictive.

Yours needs to stand out and should not sound formulaic and impersonal.

But it does show that the internet, often mocked as impersonal and uncaring, can be quite the reverse.

EXPAND

There seem to be several varieties, ranging from the completely impersonal to the utterly vindictive.

Yours needs to stand out and should not sound formulaic and impersonal.

But it does show that the internet, often mocked as impersonal and uncaring, can be quite the reverse.

The answer, it seems, it that people are alienated from an increasingly impersonal health care system.

Their faces will now live forever as well as some impersonal name in the record books.

Participants will bat around ideas in an old restored opera house instead of an impersonal conference center.

Finally, there's something deliciously handmade amid the impersonal chains.

Feedback in research is tortuously slow, impersonal and usually negative.

Both deal with the influence of impersonal systems on modern life.

Electronic media create an audience whose shifting moods are as impersonal as the weather.

Many complain of long waits and impersonal service with little follow-up care.

The more impersonal the process, the better for you and for the student, who learns that bureaucracies can't be wheedled.

In the latter, the chain bookstores are the impersonal monoliths that destroyed small independents by undercutting them on prices.

The newly do-it-yourself city is a strangely impersonal place.

Corporatization is neither inevitable nor impersonal.

Although they are convenient, these news warehouses can feel impersonal.

The die is cast in a briskly impersonal society geared to male dominance and early training for career women.

Determinisim/fatalism is based on impersonal chance.

On television, the impersonal has become the personal.

But it is less successful at explaining prejudice in one-off or impersonal transactions.

Now, inviting layers of landscape and hardscape replace those impersonal expanses of wall and pavement.

While telemedicine may seem a cold and impersonal approach to patient care, physicians say it's exactly the opposite.

To go mainstream will require adapting to a more open and perhaps more impersonal environment.

The machine itself is a mixture of impersonal robotic efficiency and.

Scher's efforts ooze skill, drive and imagination, there's ultimately something familiar and therefore impersonal about his art.

Those sobs were an eruption of humanity in what was supposed to be an impersonal interaction.

Online education is clearly not for everyone, but it certainly doesn't have to be the impersonal experience that you describe.

As many of you know, things are being done by impersonal electronic submission now.

Luxury executives explain that the internet is too impersonal for their products, which need the human touch.

The trouble with brainstorming is that it reduces people into impersonal little thought bites, little sound bites.

It must be better to err on the side of impersonal and come across as a little.

Two criticisms that jump to mind are its pale white complexion and tendency to make nature a sacred, impersonal thing.

The announcement prompted protests by soldiers' families and veterans who said the policy was too impersonal and logistics-driven.

No matter what your feelings, you need to do make the transition as professional and impersonal as possible.

She is not comfortable with the impersonal clean-up job that characterizes our funeral industry.

The white walls are bright but neutral-simply impersonal backdrops after all.

People can attack you personally for impersonal reasons.

It seemed almost absurd to have such a false, impersonal relationship with art.

COLLAPSE

Collins

World English Dictionary

impersonal (ɪmˈpɜːsən^əl)

—*adj*
1.	without reference to any individual person; objective: an impersonal assessment
2.	devoid of human warmth or sympathy; cold: an impersonal manner
3.	not having human characteristics: an impersonal God
4.	grammar (of a verb) having no logical subject. Usually in English the pronoun it is used in such cases as a grammatical subject, as for example in It is raining
5.	grammar (of a pronoun) not denoting a person

imperson'ality

—n

im'personally

—*adv*

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
Cite This Source

Etymonline

Word Origin & History

impersonal

1520, a grammatical term, from L.L. impersonalis, from in- "not" + personalis "personal." Sense of "not connected with any person" is from 1630; that of "not endowed with personality" is from 1842.

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"Three characteristics mark all confirmed expatriates: (1) slowness on the up-take, (2) the tendency to personalize the impersonal—interpreting in terms of politeness or of policy what should be kept clearly in terms of ideas, (3) the tendency to orientalize one's attitude toward women."

-Margaret Anderson

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