disembodied
Britishadjective
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lacking a body or freed from the body; incorporeal
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lacking in substance, solidity, or any firm relation to reality
Explanation
Something that's disembodied is disconnected from a solid form or body. If you hear a disembodied voice coming from your basement, it's spooky and ghostly, with no visible shape or form. Use the adjective disembodied to describe something that's separate from any substantial structure. A magic trick might make it appear that a disembodied head is floating in the air, and a mysterious voice or cry ringing out in the night would also seem to be disembodied. The root of disembodied is the verb embody, which had the earliest meaning of "invest a soul or spirit with a physical form."
Vocabulary lists containing disembodied
And Then There Were None
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The Chocolate War
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The Haunting of Hill House
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The installation ends with two vigorous Frankenthalers from 1961 and 1977, dramas enacted by disembodied pools of luminous hues.
From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 28, 2026
First comes the warning, that disembodied voice over the tannoy: "Your attention please. Air siren in the city. Please move to the shelter on the minus second floor."
From BBC • Nov. 16, 2025
I recoiled when the Wizard’s disembodied head loomed above.
From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 3, 2025
In his fall 1971 convocation address at the University of Alberta, McLuhan told students that in an electronic world, people become “discarnate data, a sort of disembodied spirit coexisting and functioning simultaneously in diverse locations.”
From Slate • Jul. 28, 2025
Frank Sinatra appears, a disembodied voice, sliding around on the tune like someone slipping on a muddy sidewalk.
From "Cat's Eye" by Margaret Atwood
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
