How to Use imitative in a Sentence

imitative

adjective

• The architecture is imitative of a Japanese temple.
• So too did the artists bring out the Mendelssohnian grace of the allegro molto from Opus 8, the imitative figures bouncing from one instrument to the next.
  — John Von Rhein, chicagotribune.com, 28 Feb. 2018
• The imitative relationship between life and art is at the core of Small’s recovery, though in a more literal way.
  — Washington Post, 8 Apr. 2022
• Our children see this, and learn to imitate it; for man is an imitative animal.
  — Andrew Delbanco, The New York Review of Books, 8 June 2022
• Her presence is a series of postures and imitative voice techniques that serve only to further etch the image of junkie mess into this portrait of a great artist who changed an art form.
  — Hilton Als, The New Yorker, 22 Feb. 2021
• So central to our culture and so often mocked — made the emblem of television at its least imaginative and most imitative, at its tritest and tiredest.
  — Robert Lloyd, Los Angeles Times, 1 Apr. 2021
• Burroughs was interrogating the universe with scissors and a paste pot, and the least imitative of authors was no plagiarist at all.
  — William Gibson, WIRED, 1 July 2005
• The Beastie Boys are a partly imitative act, and that’s what feels both so genius and so white about them—a combination of total confidence and ironic distance.
  — Josephine Livingstone, The New Republic, 24 Apr. 2020
• Instead, the lamp’s popularity in offices, libraries and homes gave rise to several rip-offs, some with names as brazenly imitative as Verdelite and...
  — Tim Gavan, WSJ, 23 Feb. 2017
• The third movement’s opening is announced by Minimalist harp figures and muted tones — suggestive of jazz, but not imitative — in the brasses.
  — Seth Colter Walls, New York Times, 10 June 2018
• Late Mozart reveals Bach’s influence, and the brief but vital episodes of imitative counterpoint in the first movement were rendered with clarity and momentum.
  — Lukas Schulze, San Diego Union-Tribune, 13 June 2022
• Some studied themselves in the wall-to-wall mirrors; others fixed their gaze on Jones, whose eyes moved from body to body as the dancers executed an arm-swinging gesture imitative of immature gawkiness.
  — Peter Marks, Washington Post, 30 Oct. 2019
• The light bulb, after all, is a supreme specimen of imitative technology, a mechanized candle.
  — Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker, 1 Mar. 2023
• Denney then chose Stop Predatory Gambling Idaho to argue against the instant racing imitative.
  — Kimberlee Kruesi, The Seattle Times, 24 July 2018
• Her singing sounds very much like Holiday but retains its own personality, rather than feeling imitative.
  — Chris Hewitt, Star Tribune, 25 Feb. 2021
• In other words, this vehicle for producer-star Rebel Wilson isn’t organic even as a genre homage; its Frankensteinian assemblage always feels more imitative than inspired.
  — Dennis Harvey, Variety, 13 May 2022
• An implication of this broader dynamic might be that environments which change more will have less pressure to enforce imitative conformity.
  — Razib Khan, Discover Magazine, 21 June 2011
• He was known for designing houses for prominent clients that were both elaborate and understated and evocative of older structures without being directly imitative of them.
  — Paul Goldberger, New York Times, 10 May 2020
• Layoffs are the result of imitative behavior and are not particularly evidence-based.
  — Brigid Kennedy, The Week, 17 Feb. 2023
• But those efforts, like so many film adaptations before them, distill essentially only the basic ingredients of their stage sources — plot, character, music — and as a result feel more imitative than transformative.
  — Washington Post, 18 Mar. 2022
• The consequences for Black communities of this imitative gesture were devastating.
  — Fintan O’Toole, The New York Review of Books, 2 Mar. 2021
• It’s often noted that Bach was famous during his life more as a performer than as a composer; his gift for improvising imitative counterpoint of superlative complexity was what his reputation rested upon.
  — Luke Schulze, San Diego Union-Tribune, 8 Dec. 2022
• In February, the council directed staff to collaborate with legal service providers and launch a coordinated imitative to provide access to legal representation to Santa Ana residents at risk of removal who cannot afford an attorney.
  — Jessica Kwong, Orange County Register, 17 May 2017
• That indifference comes in different shades -- genuine, imitative or self-cultivated.
  — Andrei Kolesnikov, CNN, 21 Sep. 2022
• Yes, with endless imitative ramifications for minimalist interior design.
  — Peter Schjeldahl, The New Yorker, 26 Sep. 2022

Last Updated: 5 Sep 2024