bastionbas‧ti‧on /ˈbæstiən $ -tʃən/ noun [countable] 
These clubs are the last bastions of male privilege.2a place where a country or army has strong military defences: Pearl Harbor was the principal American bastion in the Pacific.3 technical a part of a castle wall that sticks out from the rest
WORD ORIGINbastion
Origin:
1500-1600 French bastille ‘strong building, castle’, from Old Provençal bastida, from bastir ‘to build’EXAMPLES FROM THE CORPUS
- A bastion of male privilege on the rocky Dublin shoreline, so called because of the water depth.
- In colonial times, Western missionaries would dash off to bastions of other faiths to preach the Gospel.
- Its empire had collapsed, its protective ring of island bastions smashed, its people on the verge of starvation.
- Male bastions like the pub, the football stadium and the military have been stormed.
- No Socialist bastion remained intact, no government minister or party leader unthreatened.
- Silly though it may have seemed at first, these all-male secret societies are bastions of extraordinary power and influence.
- The bureaucrats in their Brussels bastion wrongly presumed that bigger is better.
- They manned the towers and bastions and the great gates were shut fast.
WORD SETS
arcade, nounarch, nounarchitect, nounarchitecture, nounatrium, nounbailey, nounbastion, nouncampanile, nouncapital, nouncaryatid, nouncloistered, adjectivecolonial, adjectiveconservationist, nounCorinthian, adjectivecornice, noundolmen, noundome, noundomed, adjectiveDoric, adjectivefloor plan, nounflying buttress, nounfolly, nounGeorgian, adjectiveGothic, adjectiveground plan, nounIonic, adjectivemodernism, nounmonolith, nounmonument, nounmonumental, adjectiveNorman, adjectiveobelisk, nounopen-plan, adjectivepedestal, nounpediment, nounperistyle, nounpitched, adjectiveplinth, nounplot, nounportico, nounquadrangle, nounrambling, adjectiverampart, nounrococo, adjectiveRomanesque, adjectivescreen, nounspan, nounsplit-level, adjectivesquare, nounstonework, nounterrace, nountracery, nountransept, nountruss, nounvaulted, adjectivevaulting, nounvestibule, noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM THE ENTRY These clubs are the last bastions of male privilege.COLLOCATIONS FROM THE CORPUSADJECTIVE
1something that protects a way of life, principle etc that seems likely to change or end completelybastion of These clubs are the last bastions of male privilege.· They have rewritten the record books, stormed the male bastion of Grandmaster chess, and defied the laws of probability.
These clubs are the last bastions of male privilege.2a place where a country or army has strong military defences: Pearl Harbor was the principal American bastion in the Pacific.3 technical a part of a castle wall that sticks out from the rest