Adjacent Words

Progressive definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

PROGRESS'IVE, a. Moving forward; proceeding onward; advancing; as progressive motion or course; opposed to retrograde.
1. Improving. The arts are in a progressive state.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: favoring or promoting progress; "progressive schools" [ant: regressive]
2: favoring or promoting reform (often by government action) [syn: progressive, reformist, reform-minded]
3: (of taxes) adjusted so that the rate increases as the amount of income increases [ant: regressive]
4: gradually advancing in extent
5: (of a card game or a dance) involving a series of sections for which the participants successively change place or relative position; "progressive euchre"; "progressive tournaments"
6: advancing in severity; "progressive paralysis" n
1: a tense of verbs used in describing action that is on-going [syn: progressive, progressive tense, imperfect, imperfect tense, continuous tense]
2: a person who favors a political philosophy of progress and reform and the protection of civil liberties [syn: liberal, liberalist, progressive] [ant: conservative, conservativist]

Merriam Webster's

I. adjective Date: circa 1612 1. a. of, relating to, or characterized by progress b. making use of or interested in new ideas, findings, or opportunities c. of, relating to, or constituting an educational theory marked by emphasis on the individual child, informality of classroom procedure, and encouragement of self-expression 2. of, relating to, or characterized by progression 3. moving forward or onward ; advancing 4. a. increasing in extent or severity <a progressive disease> b. increasing in rate as the base increases <a progressive tax> 5. often capitalized of or relating to political Progressives 6. of, relating to, or constituting a verb form that expresses action or state in progress at the time of speaking or a time spoken of • progressively adverb • progressiveness noun II. noun Date: 1846 1. a. one that is progressive b. one believing in moderate political change and especially social improvement by governmental action 2. capitalized a member of any of various United States political parties: as a. a member of a predominantly agrarian minor party that around 1912 split off from the Republicans; specifically Bull Moose b. a follower of Robert M. La Follette in the presidential campaign of 1924 c. a follower of Henry A. Wallace in the presidential campaign of 1948

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. & n. --adj. 1 moving forward (progressive motion). 2 proceeding step by step; cumulative (progressive drug use). 3 a (of a political party, government, etc.) favouring or implementing rapid progress or social reform. b modern; efficient (this is a progressive company). 4 (of disease, violence, etc.) increasing in severity or extent. 5 (of taxation) at rates increasing with the sum taxed. 6 (of a card-game, dance, etc.) with periodic changes of partners. 7 Gram. (of an aspect) expressing an action in progress, e.g. am writing, was writing. 8 (of education) informal and without strict discipline, stressing individual needs. --n. (also Progressive) an advocate of progressive political policies. Derivatives: progressively adv. progressiveness n. progressivism n. progressivist n. & adj. Etymology: F progressif -ive or med.L progressivus (as PROGRESS)

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Producer's rent Producer's rent Progressive Pro*gress"ive, a. (U. S. Politics) Of or pertaining to the Progressive party.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Progressive Pro*gress"ive, a. [Cf. F. progressif.] 1. Moving forward; proceeding onward; advancing; evincing progress; increasing; as, progressive motion or course; -- opposed to retrograde. 2. Improving; as, art is in a progressive state. Progressive euchre or whist, a way of playing at card parties, by which after every game, the losers at the first table go to the last table, and the winners at all the tables, except the first, move up to the next table. Progressive muscular atrophy (Med.), a nervous disorder characterized by continuous atrophy of the muscles. -- Pro*gress"ive*ly, adv. -- Pro*gress"ive*ness, n.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(progressives) 1. Someone who is progressive or has progressive ideas has modern ideas about how things should be done, rather than traditional ones. ...a progressive businessman who had voted for Roosevelt in 1932 and 1936... The children go to a progressive school. ? conservative ADJ • A progressive is someone who is progressive. The Republicans were deeply split between progressives and conservatives. ? conservative N-COUNT 2. A progressive change happens gradually over a period of time. One prominent symptom of the disease is progressive loss of memory. = gradual ? sudden ADJ: usu ADJ n • progressively Her symptoms became progressively worse... The amount of grant the council received from the Government was progressively reduced. = gradually ADV: ADV compar, ADV with v 3. In grammar, progressive means the same as continuous. ADJ: ADJ n

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. Advancing, proceeding. 2. Improving, developing.

Moby Thesaurus

Fabian, a la mode, advanced, advancing, ameliorative, ascending, avant-garde, axial, back, back-flowing, backward, bettering, catenary, consecutive, contemporary, continuing, continuous, descending, developing, down-trending, downward, drifting, dynamic, extremist, far out, fashionable, flowing, fluent, flying, forward, forward-looking, go-ahead, going, gradual, growing, gyrational, gyratory, improving, in, increasing, left, left of center, left-wing, left-winger, leftist, liberal, liberalist, liberalistic, lineal, linear, looking up, meliorative, meliorist, mending, mod, modern, modernistic, modernized, modish, mounting, moving, newfashioned, now, on the left, on the lift, on the mend, oncoming, ongoing, onward, ordinal, passing, plunging, present-day, present-time, proceeding, progressing, progressionist, progressist, progressivist, progressivistic, radical, reflowing, refluent, reformer, reformist, regressive, retrogressive, revisionist, revolutionary, rising, rotary, rotational, rotatory, running, rushing, sequent, sequential, serial, seriate, sideward, sinking, soaring, step by step, streaming, streamlined, successional, successive, twentieth-century, ultra-ultra, ultramodern, up-to-date, up-to-datish, up-to-the-minute, up-trending, upward, utopian, utopist, way out, welfare stater