dislocation

Meanings

Plural: dislocations

Noun

• an event that results in a displacement or discontinuity
• the act of disrupting an established order so it fails to continue
  • "the social dislocations resulting from government policies"
• a displacement of a part (especially a bone) from its normal position (as in the shoulder or the vertebral column)
• The act of displacing, or the state of being displaced.
• The displacement of parts of rocks or portions of strata from the situation which they originally occupied.
• The act of dislocating, or putting out of joint; also, the condition of being thus displaced.
• A linear defect in a crystal lattice. Because dislocations can shift within the crystal lattice, they tend to weaken the material, compared to a perfect crystal.
• A sentence structure in which a constituent that could otherwise be either an argument or an adjunct of a clause occurs outside of and adjacent to the clause boundaries.
• In men's gymnastics, a rotating of the shoulders when performing a backwards turn on the still rings. Many skills in acrobatics appear to involve dislocating a joint, when they actually do not.

Synonyms

breakdown, disruption, luxation