IMITATION

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does imitation mean? 

• IMITATION (noun)
  The noun IMITATION has 4 senses:

1. the doctrine that representations of nature or human behavior should be accurate imitations

2. something copied or derived from an original

3. copying (or trying to copy) the actions of someone else

4. a representation of a person that is exaggerated for comic effect

  Familiarity information: IMITATION used as a noun is uncommon.

• IMITATION (adjective)
  The adjective IMITATION has 1 sense:

1. not genuine or real; being an imitation of the genuine article

  Familiarity information: IMITATION used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• IMITATION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The doctrine that representations of nature or human behavior should be accurate imitations

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Hypernyms ("imitation" is a kind of...):

doctrine; ism; philosophical system; philosophy; school of thought (a belief (or system of beliefs) accepted as authoritative by some group or school)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "imitation"):

mimesis (the imitative representation of nature and human behavior in art and literature)

Antonym:

formalism (the doctrine that formal structure rather than content is what should be represented)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Something copied or derived from an original

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("imitation" is a kind of...):

copy (a thing made to be similar or identical to another thing)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "imitation"):

fake; postiche; sham (something that is a counterfeit; not what it seems to be)

counterfeit; forgery (a copy that is represented as the original)

Sense 3

Meaning:

Copying (or trying to copy) the actions of someone else

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Hypernyms ("imitation" is a kind of...):

copying (an act of copying)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "imitation"):

echo (an imitation or repetition)

emulation (effort to equal or surpass another)

mimicry (the resemblance of an animal species to another species or to natural objects; provides concealment and protection from predators)

Derivation:

imitate (reproduce someone's behavior or looks)

Sense 4

Meaning:

A representation of a person that is exaggerated for comic effect

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

caricature; imitation; impersonation

Hypernyms ("imitation" is a kind of...):

humor; humour; wit; witticism; wittiness (a message whose ingenuity or verbal skill or incongruity has the power to evoke laughter)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "imitation"):

mock-heroic (a satirical imitation of heroic verse)

burlesque; lampoon; mockery; parody; pasquinade; put-on; send-up; sendup; spoof; takeoff; travesty (a composition that imitates or misrepresents somebody's style, usually in a humorous way)

• IMITATION (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Not genuine or real; being an imitation of the genuine article

Synonyms:

fake; false; faux; imitation; simulated

Context example:

a purse of simulated alligator hide

Similar:

artificial; unreal (contrived by art rather than nature)

 Context examples 

She exclaimed, however, with a very tolerable imitation of nature:—Oh! dear! very true.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

In educating the youth of both sexes, their method is admirable, and highly deserves our imitation.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

“Angry,” I answered, with an involuntary imitation of his dark frown.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Upon my word, Caroline, I should think it more possible to get Pemberley by purchase than by imitation.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

A fraudulent imitation, Watson, though I should hardly dare to hint as much to our specialist.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Do you remember Hawkins Browne's 'Address to Tobacco,' in imitation of Pope?

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

He had chosen this work, he said, because the declamatory style was framed in imitation of the Eastern authors.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Contagious yawning is triggered involuntarily when we observe another person yawn -it is a common form of echophenomena- the automatic imitation of another's words (echolalia) or actions (echopraxia).

(Why Is Yawning so Contagious?, The Titi Tudorancea Bulletin)

All the blame of this should have fallen upon Jo, for her naughty imitation had been too lifelike to escape detection, and the frolicsome Lambs had permitted the joke to escape.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

And I showed him an example, and sat down myself in my customary seat and with as fair an imitation of my ordinary manner to a patient, as the lateness of the hour, the nature of my preoccupations, and the horror I had of my visitor, would suffer me to muster.

(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)