objectify
/ɒbˈdʒɛktɪfʌɪ
/verb (objectifies, objectifying, objectified) [with object]
1Degrade to the status of a mere object: a deeply sexist attitude that objectifies women...
- This all reminds me much of clients who come to me begging to serve me, to make them utterly obedient, to humiliate and degrade and objectify them - just as they have imagined it in their fantasies, to the note.
- A danger exists that they will be objectified and degraded.
- If the company really cared about preventing domestic violence, it would stop sexist advertising that objectifies women and contributes to attitudes that allow domestic violence to continue.
2Express (something abstract) in a concrete form: good poetry objectifies feeling...
- Sharon seems to be deflecting on the art of understanding poetry in itself, because she objectifies this work with the woman as she knew her.
- So it came as a surprise to contemporaries that Stanley Kubrick, the genius behind the stunning montage shots and obscure symbolism of 2001: A Space Odyssey, should turn that ruthlessly objectifying skill of his to a Steven King novel.
- The tool for representing, for objectifying one's experience in order to deal with it, culture, is so saturated with male bias that women almost never have a chance to see themselves culturally through their own eyes.
Origin
Mid 19th century: from the noun object + -i- + -fy.