colonizationn.
/ˌkɒlənʌɪˈzeɪʃn/, U.S. /ˌkɑlənəˈzeɪʃən/, /ˌkɑləˌnaɪˈzeɪʃən/ 1.
a. The action or process of establishing a colony or colonies in a place, esp. as part of an effort (typically by a foreign state) to appropriate the area settled and to assert political control over any indigenous inhabitants; the fact of being colonized in this way. Chiefly with of or possessive indicating the place colonized.
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society > inhabiting and dwelling > furnishing with inhabitants > colonizing > [noun]
planting1584
plantation1587
settling1609
colonizinga1626
situationa1657
seating1700
colonization1747
settlement1827
pioneering1851
1747 S. Boyse Hist. Rev. Trans. Europe II. 182 The Colonization of the new depopulated Parts of the Highlands by an industrious Set of People, who, by intermixing with the Natives, may teach them the inestimable Advantages arising from Diligence and Commerce.
1776 A. Smith Inq. Wealth of Nations II. iv. vii. 190 The discovery and colonization of America. View more context for this quotation
1840 J. B. Robinson Canada & Canada Bill 50 The colonization of our American provinces shall be undertaken.
1861 G. Smith Irish Hist. 99 James carried on the colonization of Ireland.
1867 E. A. Freeman Hist. Norman Conquest I. iv. 216 Some real Danish colonization of the peninsula.
1925 V. G. Childe Dawn European Civilization vii. 107 The civilization..endured till the colonization of the island by the Carthaginians in the fourth century B.C.
1944 R. Carter Little Ships (1948) 101 The name of mullet-boats dates back to the very early days of New Zealand's colonization.
2010 Searcher Feb. 42/3 The metal may be..an alloy introduced to Europe following the Dutch colonisation of Java, where they found it in use for decorative metalwork.
b. The policy, practice, or principle of establishing a colony or colonies.
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1751 T. Beck Observ. Mr. Fielding's Enq. Increase of Robbers ii. 66 Is it an extravagant supposition to conjecture that the possession of..the Marian Islands, may receive an advantageous colonization from such an exiled body of our countrymen?
1770 E. Burke Thoughts Present Discontents 6 Our growth by colonization and by conquest.
1840 J. B. Robinson Canada & Canada Bill 46 Colonization would be the cheapest, as well as the most certain and satisfactory method of providing the security that has just been spoken of.
1847 G. Grote Hist. Greece III. ii. xxii. 461 The stream of Grecian colonisation to the westward..begins from the 11th Olympiad.
1871 B. Jowett in tr. Plato Dialogues IV. 51 Colonization is in some ways easier when the colony is drawn from one country.
1917 H. Webster Early European Hist. ii. xxvi. 642 The three words ‘gospel, glory, and gold’ sum up the principal motives of European colonization in the sixteenth century.
2009 H. Hawksley Democracy Kills 381 This is a very different concept from the maligned and often-cited return to colonization and imperialism.
2. The policy, practice, or principle of establishing people (typically a group with a shared identity, status, etc.) in a colony; spec. the (proposed) resettlement of free black people (esp. those emancipated from slavery) from the United States in colonies in Africa or elsewhere in the first half of the 19th cent. Now chiefly historical.Recorded earliest as a modifier.
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1791 J. Bentham Panopticon Postscr. ii. v. 464 The planners of the Colonization scheme.
1816 Pittsburgh Gaz. 31 Dec. [Headline of a report of a resolution of the general assembly of Virginia to request territory on the shore of the North Pacific or some other place to serve as an asylum for free persons of colour.] Colonization of the Blacks.
1831 N. J. Wyeth Let. 17 Oct. in F. G. Young Corr. N. Wyeth (1899) 3 In the absence of the Genl. Agent for the Oregon Colonization Society I take the liberty of addressing to you the following queries.
1885 Chicago Legal News 24 Jan. 168/3 During our war crime ceased.., because war created a demand for the criminal and made him useful. Colonization of criminals will do exactly the same thing.
1901 Amer. Israelite 3 Oct. 4/2 During the last twenty yars there have been made a number of efforts at colonization of Jews in agricultural communities in America and other countries.
1942 Sun (Baltimore) 15 Nov. 13/4 Success of the Dominican experiment..would demonstrate that mass colonization of European refugees is practicable in tropical countries wherein lie most of the world's potential settlement areas.
2021 M. E. Steiner Lincoln & Citizenship iii. 56 In the 1840s and through most of the 1850s, almost all free black people rejected colonization in Liberia, and most rejected emigration to Central America or Canada.
3.
a. U.S. Politics. The action of placing political supporters in a district where their votes will be important in an election. Now chiefly historical. Cf. colonist n. 4, colonizer n. 2a, colonize v. 3b.
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1838 Extra Globe (Washington, D.C.) 13 Sept. 394/1 It has been ascertained that by the colonization of a few voters from strong Federal counties, the Republican ascendency in several others might have been more than neutralized.
1842 Congress. Globe 31 May App. 471/1 Among these [sc. modern phrases describing political knavery] ‘colonization’ and ‘pipe-laying’ were the most significant.
1919 Boston Globe 3 Oct. 17/2 Surprise at the..unqualified denial of allegations that colonization and fraud were practiced in the election.
1946 Detroit Free Press 2 Apr. 3/8 Nelson called public housing inflationary and a factor contributing to high costs. He said it permits colonization of voters and threatens free enterprise.
2008 M. Burlingame Abraham Lincoln: A Life I. xiii. 545 To thwart this so-called colonization of voters, Lincoln offered Judd ‘a bare suggestion’.
b. U.S. Politics. The infiltration of a place, group, or organization, typically for the purposes of political subversion. Now rare.Chiefly with reference to the activities of communist parties.
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1929 Daily Worker (N.Y.) 23 Dec. 4/2 In laying plans for reaching women and recruiting them for the Party, each district will be faced with the problem of colonization. Forces from the cities will have to be shifted to the smaller towns where the large plants are concentrated.
1958 Comm. Un-Amer. Activities: Ann. Rep. 1957 (U.S. House of Representatives, 83rd Congr. 2nd Sess.) 21 The committee hearings highlighted the growing use of the Communist techniques of colonization of industry by small cadres of highly trained, disciplined party members.
1981 J. Barnes & S. Clark Changing Face U.S. Politics 50 When the party is falsely told to choose between an effort to get comrades into industry and carrying out organized political campaigns, then, of course, colonization will fail.
4. Biology.
a. The spreading of a species of plant, animal, or other organism into a new area, habitat, or host (cf. colonize v. 4a, 4c); the establishment of a colony of an organism.
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the world > life > biology > balance of nature > distribution > [noun] > introduction or spread to new areas
peregrination1670
naturalization1830
colonization1863
cosmopolitanization1889
invasion1905
1863 H. Spencer Ess. 2nd Ser. 98 The chances of early colonization are immensely in favour of species which, multiplying by agamogenesis, can people a whole shore from a single germ.
1895 F. E. Beddard Text-bk. Zoogeogr. v. 225 The case of the rabbit shows that we cannot get out of this difficulty by assuming that as much colonisation as there was room for has as a matter of fact taken place.
1905 F. E. Clements Res. Methods Ecol. iv. 210 By invasion is understood the movement of plants from an area..into one of a different character, and their colonization in the latter.
1939 Jrnl. Animal Ecol. 8 37 Two years' observation on the colonization of this piece of shore.
1971 Irish Jrnl. Agric. Res. 10 203 That the sterilised pieces were colonised by fungi less frequently than the unsterilised may be explained by the substantial bacterial colonisation of the sterile pieces.
2016 Proc. National Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 113 6821/1 Both Leishmania parasites and Borrelia spirochetes use abundantly expressed surface proteins to specifically bind receptors on epithelial cells, promoting successful gut colonization.
b. The establishment and maintenance in a laboratory of a breeding colony of an organism, such as an insect pest or disease vector (cf. colonized adj. 3).
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1950 Public Health Rep. 65 546 These results point a way toward further possible experimentation along the same line with this group of flies and with other insects that have resisted colonization.
1966 W. H. R. Lumsden & D. S. Saunders in C. N. Smith Insect Colonization & Mass Production xi. 153 The colonization of Glossina (tsetse flies) is required..first, to provide uniform material for use in experimental work, and second, to provide flies in large numbers for irradiation and release.
1997 R. H. Gooding et al. in J. M. Crampton et al. Molecular Biol. Insect Disease Vectors v. 54 Any genetic bottleneck during initial colonization will, in most cases, lead to loss of the colony.
Compounds
As a modifier, with the sense ‘of, for, or relating to colonization (in various senses)’, as in colonization process, colonization scheme, etc.
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1787 J. Bentham Panopticon (1791) 464 The planners of the Colonization scheme.
1837 H. Martineau Society in Amer. II. 111 The chief officers of the Colonisation Society.
1922 World Tomorrow July 212/2 The colonization plan offers the only solution to the development of the cutover country [i.e. former forest land which has been cleared].
1944 A. A. Roback Dict. Internat. Slurs 58 Peruvian Jews, Jews, who having been unable to cope with colonization conditions in South America come to settle in South Africa.
2014 Hist. Ireland Sept. 4/2 The Anglo-Norman colonisation process in the late twelfth century.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, March 2022).
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