verb
- treating or representing something as having a fixed, unchanging nature or set of characteristics; reducing something complex to a single essential quality
Usage: present participle of 'essentialise' (British spelling); also spelled 'essentializing' in U.S. English; often used critically in academic and social contexts
Examples
- The critic argued that the film was essentialising women by portraying them as one-dimensional characters.
- Essentialising cultural identity ignores the diversity within any group.
- Scholars warn against essentialising gender roles based on outdated assumptions.
- The marketing campaign was accused of essentialising Asian cultures into a single stereotype.
- By essentialising human nature, the theory failed to account for individual variation and social context.
- Essentialising race as a biological category has been thoroughly discredited by modern science.