| 1. | a place or situation remote from worldly or practical affairs: the university as an ivory tower. |
| 2. | an attitude of aloofness from or disdain or disregard for worldly or practical affairs: his ivory tower of complacency. |
| ivory tower n. A place or attitude of retreat, especially preoccupation with lofty, remote, or intellectual considerations rather than practical everyday life. [Translation of French tour d'ivoire : tour, tower + de, of + ivoire, ivory.] |
ivory tower
A place or attitude of retreat, remoteness from everyday affairs, as in What does the professor know about student life, living as he does in an ivory tower? This term is a translation of the French tour d'ivoire, which the critic Saint-Beuve used to describe the attitude of poet Alfred de Vigny in 1837. It is used most often in reference to intellectuals and artists who remain complacently aloof.