Bleaching

//ˈbliːt͡ʃɪŋ// noun, verb

noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The process of removing stains or of whitening fabrics, especially by the use of chemical agents. countable, uncountable
  2. 2
    The loss or removal of part of the (semantic, grammatical, etc) content or a word or morpheme. countable, uncountable

    "Grammaticalization is often associated with 'semantic bleaching', and this 'bleaching' is the result of reanalysis […] But there is no evidence that the bleaching of the meaning of do played any role in the causation of this sequence of events."

Verb
  1. 1
    present participle and gerund of bleach form-of, gerund, participle, present

Synonyms

All synonyms
achromatizationalbificationblanchingbleachdecolorationdecolorization

Example

More examples

"Coral bleaching does not immediately kill corals. They have the potential to recover if temperatures drop back below stressful levels and remain there for a long period of time—with no new shocks."

Related phrases

bleaching agentbleaching powdercoral bleachingsemantic bleaching

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.