ivory tower
nounEtymology
Calque of French tour d'ivoire, based on a biblical phrase, coined by Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve to compare the poet Alfred de Vigny (more isolated) with Victor Hugo (more socially engaged). First attested in English in a translation of Laughter by French philosopher Henri Bergson (1911). The term was popularized in The Ivory Tower (1917) by Henry James, though used in different sense (millionaires, not professors).
- derived from tour d'ivoire
Definitions
A sheltered, overly-academic existence or perspective, implying a disconnection or lack…
A sheltered, overly-academic existence or perspective, implying a disconnection or lack of awareness of reality or practical considerations.
- Such a proposal looks fine from an ivory tower, but it could never work in real life.
- Hamilton College is an ivory tower with an open bar, and so I - who work and play equally hard - have come to love this place, and have been dead-set against leaving it.
Separated from reality and practical matters
Separated from reality and practical matters; overly academic.
- The majority of librarians appear to have shown a very ivory tower approach to the application of all types of management technique to librarianship.
- I must say that, with all due respect, I think that's a very ivory tower approach.
- Bob Woodruff, an anchor and correspondent for ABC News who arrived in New Orleans the Wednesday after the storm hit, calls the detached-observer ideal "a very ivory tower notion that's not practiced in the field."
The neighborhood
Vish — recursive loop
No curated loop yet for ivory tower. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.
sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA