Meaning of raison d'être | Babel Free

Definitions

A reason for being; the claimed reason for the existence of something or someone; the sole or ultimate purpose of something or someone.

Equivalents

Examples

“Surfing became his raison d’être.”

“These raison d'etre and this evolution are not merely the achievement of men's conscious activity but are the unintentional results of their social activity.”

“It [Sacramento] is a town in which defense industry and its absentee owners are suddenly the most important facts; a town which has never had more people or more money, but has lost its raison d'être.”

“One after another, styles supplant one another. The most enduring twentieth-century school, Abstract Expressionism, held sway for at most twenty years, from 1940 to 1960, then to be followed by a wild succession- "Pop" lasting perhaps five years, "Op" managing to grip the public's attention for two or three years, then the emergence, approximately enough, of 'Kinetic Art' whose very raison d’être is transience.”

“National development plans and programs are in particular under harsh discussions and criticism including these raison d'etre in some countries, for these plans and programs have supported construction of rather inefficient infrastructure in less-development area.”

“With hindsight knowledge, it is interesting to note that these three raison d’etre and their ramifications were situated in a broader context of contestations over the whole enterprise of knowledge production and consumption.”

“Of course, closure of the West station took away the hotel's raison d'être. In May 2012, the local newspaper reported that this historic hotel, by then rated the town's worst (exemplified by its final review: "Please avoid at all costs"), was to be converted into 31 first-time-buyer one-bedroom flats.”

CEFR level