Illustrative
adjective
Used to explain or make something clear by using examples.
She gave an illustrative example to explain her point.
Often appears as...
- illustrative example
- illustrative diagram
adjective
Used to show something visually, like with a picture or diagram.
The book has several illustrative diagrams to help understand the topic.
Often appears as...
- illustrative drawing
- illustrative figure
Usage tips
Academic
adjective
Used to explain or make something clear by using examples.
She gave an illustrative example to explain her point.
Often appears as...
- illustrative example
- illustrative diagram
adjective
Used to show something visually, like with a picture or diagram.
The book has several illustrative diagrams to help understand the topic.
Often appears as...
- illustrative drawing
- illustrative figure
Usage tips
Academic
Definition 1 of 2
Pro Tip 1/3Clarify Examples
Use 'illustrative' when providing an example that helps clarify or explain your main point further.
To clarify, let's use an illustrative case where customer feedback improved a product.
Pro Tip 2/3Enhance Understanding
'Illustrative' suggests that the example you provide will enhance the listener's understanding of the topic.
This is an illustrative example to show the difference between metaphors and similes.
Pro Tip 3/3Specific Cases
When you refer to something as 'illustrative', it often involves a specific case or situation that exemplifies a broader concept.
The rise and fall of the company is illustrative of the industry's volatility.
Pro Tip 1/3Clarify Examples
Use 'illustrative' when providing an example that helps clarify or explain your main point further.
To clarify, let's use an illustrative case where customer feedback improved a product.
Pro Tip 2/3Enhance Understanding
'Illustrative' suggests that the example you provide will enhance the listener's understanding of the topic.
This is an illustrative example to show the difference between metaphors and similes.
Pro Tip 3/3Specific Cases
When you refer to something as 'illustrative', it often involves a specific case or situation that exemplifies a broader concept.
The rise and fall of the company is illustrative of the industry's volatility.
Pro Tip 1/3Clarify Examples
Use 'illustrative' when providing an example that helps clarify or explain your main point further.
To clarify, let's use an illustrative case where customer feedback improved a product.
Pro Tip 2/3Enhance Understanding
'Illustrative' suggests that the example you provide will enhance the listener's understanding of the topic.
This is an illustrative example to show the difference between metaphors and similes.
Pro Tip 3/3Specific Cases
When you refer to something as 'illustrative', it often involves a specific case or situation that exemplifies a broader concept.
The rise and fall of the company is illustrative of the industry's volatility.
Compare with
demonstrativedescriptiveevocativeexplanatoryexpressivegraphicpictorialrepresentative
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Video examples
How to green the world's...
calculate that, for illustrative purposes, if we do what I am showing you here, we can take enough carbon out of the atmosphere and safely store it in the grassland soils for thousands of years, and if we just do that on about half the world's grasslands
Video examples
Expedition Everest: The...
worth a thousand words if you have a lot of pictures and you can create a very illustrative map with lots of information that is very very essential to understand these glaciers and their dynamics
Video examples
How to green the world's...
calculate that, for illustrative purposes, if we do what I am showing you here, we can take enough carbon out of the atmosphere and safely store it in the grassland soils for thousands of years, and if we just do that on about half the world's grasslands
Video examples
Expedition Everest: The...
worth a thousand words if you have a lot of pictures and you can create a very illustrative map with lots of information that is very very essential to understand these glaciers and their dynamics
Example 1 of 2
Quote examples
Aaron Siskind
American Photographer
I may be wrong, but the essential illustrative nature of most documentary photography, and the worship of the object per se, in our best nature photography, is not enough to satisfy the man of today, compounded as he is of Christ, Freud, and Marx.
Quote examples
Samuel Ervin Beam
American Musician
I like writing in an illustrative, descriptive way. I prefer describing to rather than explaining. One, I rarely have anything to say. It's much more interesting for me to discover some meaning that you didn't know that you could create.
Quote examples
Antony Gormley
British Artist
Art is the means by which we communicate what it feels like to be alive - in the past, that was mixed up with other illustrative duties, but that was still its central function that has been liberated in the art called modern.
Quote examples
Idries Shah
Indian Author
One of the tragedies of modern times is that people have come to believe that something said by someone in the past, perhaps for illustrative or provocation purposes, actually represents that person's beliefs at the time.
Quote examples
Edward Bok
American Editor
It is the growth of advertising in this country which, more than any single element, has brought the American magazine to its present enviable position in points of literary, illustrative and mechanical excellence.
Quote examples
Kate Bernheimer
American Writer
I love the idea of the 'vignette,' which is associated with the decorative, illustrative, small, and thus with the feminine, and thus easily maligned. I mean, Emily Dickinson wrote vignettes, right?
Quote examples
Denise Mina
Scottish Writer
Comics don't work if the story is all in the text and the images are illustrative. It's hard to have enough faith in the artists to allow them to do their job.
Quote examples
Michael Bergdahl
American Author
Sam Walton was a master storyteller who used illustrative stories to reinforce his cultural standards.
Quote examples
Bob Kane
American Artist
The New Look of Batman is more illustrative and realistic.
Quote examples
Aaron Siskind
American Photographer
I may be wrong, but the essential illustrative nature of most documentary photography, and the worship of the object per se, in our best nature photography, is not enough to satisfy the man of today, compounded as he is of Christ, Freud, and Marx.
Quote examples
Samuel Ervin Beam
American Musician
I like writing in an illustrative, descriptive way. I prefer describing to rather than explaining. One, I rarely have anything to say. It's much more interesting for me to discover some meaning that you didn't know that you could create.
Quote examples
Antony Gormley
British Artist
Art is the means by which we communicate what it feels like to be alive - in the past, that was mixed up with other illustrative duties, but that was still its central function that has been liberated in the art called modern.
Quote examples
Idries Shah
Indian Author
One of the tragedies of modern times is that people have come to believe that something said by someone in the past, perhaps for illustrative or provocation purposes, actually represents that person's beliefs at the time.
Quote examples
Edward Bok
American Editor
It is the growth of advertising in this country which, more than any single element, has brought the American magazine to its present enviable position in points of literary, illustrative and mechanical excellence.
Quote examples
Kate Bernheimer
American Writer
I love the idea of the 'vignette,' which is associated with the decorative, illustrative, small, and thus with the feminine, and thus easily maligned. I mean, Emily Dickinson wrote vignettes, right?
Quote examples
Denise Mina
Scottish Writer
Comics don't work if the story is all in the text and the images are illustrative. It's hard to have enough faith in the artists to allow them to do their job.
Quote examples
Michael Bergdahl
American Author
Sam Walton was a master storyteller who used illustrative stories to reinforce his cultural standards.
Quote examples
Bob Kane
American Artist
The New Look of Batman is more illustrative and realistic.
Example 1 of 9
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