Aporia
Definition, Meaning & Examples
Pronunciation /əˈpɔːɹɪə/ · Part of speech noun
Quick meaning: Aporia is a noun meaning (rhetoric) An expression of deliberation with oneself regarding uncertainty or doubt as to how to proceed.
Meaning
(rhetoric) An expression of deliberation with oneself regarding uncertainty or doubt as to how to proceed.
More Meanings
- (philosophy, post-structuralism) An apparently insoluble contradiction or tension, especially in a text's meaning; a logical impasse suggested by a text or speaker; a paradox.
Example Sentences
Meanings are superposed in an aporia – not ‘either/or’, but ‘and/and’.
Aporia oft in doubt and fear will rest, And reason with itself what may be best.
EL James's multimillion selling series of novels ‘encodes the aporias of heterosexual relationships’, according to Professor Eva Illouz[.]
Plato believed that the core impulse to philosophizing lies in aporia, the point at which, in struggling to understand a phenomenon or answer a question, we come up against a seemingly irresolvable contradiction.
Word Forms
- aporias
Synonyms for aporia
Depending on context, synonyms include impasse, paradox, contradiction.
Related Words
Related dictionary entries include addubitation, reticence, preterition, apodioxis, apocrisis, aversio.
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Sources & Attribution
FreeDictionaryAPI.com / Wiktionary · Original source · CC BY-SA 4.0
Dictionary data is provided by FreeDictionaryAPI.com and sourced from Wiktionary under its stated license.