pervasive
adjective
Did you know?
Is pervasive always negative?
Pervasive is most often used of things we don't really want spreading throughout all parts of something:
a pervasive problem
a stench that is pervasive
pervasive corruption
But pervasive can occasionally also be found in neutral and even positive contexts:
a pervasive rhythm
a pervasive sense of calm
The meaning isn't neutral when the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) uses it. Beginning in the early 1990s, the MPAA started giving the R rating to movies with "pervasive language." Most movies have language throughout, of course. The MPAA is using the phrase "pervasive language" to refer to the frequent use of a particular kind of language: profanity.
Examples of pervasive in a Sentence
Mark Slouka, Harper's, November 2004
The manic money-grab excitement of the Nineties had never been altogether free of our pervasive American guilt.
—Norman Mailer, New York Review of Books, 27 Mar. 2002
Race was never articulated as an issue at the trial, even though its presence was pervasive.
—Howard Chua-Eoan, Time, 6 Mar. 2000
the pervasive nature of the problem
television's pervasive influence on our culture
Expert Panel®, Forbes.com, 22 July 2025
This floods the novel with a pervasive ontological instability; at the same time, these ghostly presences become an organizing principle for the style and form of the book itself.
—Katie Kitamura, Harpers Magazine, 16 July 2025
Its two major beneficiaries are PBS and NPR, outlets whose progressive bias is pervasive and well documented.
—The Editors, National Review, 14 July 2025
The strategy has become so pervasive that brands are now competing to see who can mine the deepest emotional connections from our collective past.
—Kimberly Wilson, Essence, 14 July 2025
See All Example Sentences for pervasive
Cite this Entry
“Pervasive.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pervasive. Accessed 29 Jul. 2025.
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pervasive
adjective
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