progressive

• POS: Adjective, Noun
• HYPHEN: Pro=gres=sive

CIDE DICTIONARY

progressive, a. [Cf. F. progressif.].

•  Moving forward; proceeding onward; advancing; evincing progress; increasing; as, progressive motion or course; -- opposed to retrograde.  [1913 Webster]
•  Improving; as, art is in a progressive state.  [1913 Webster]
•  Of or pertaining to the Progressive party.  [Webster 1913 Suppl.]
•  Favoring improvement, change, progress, or reform, especially in a political context; -- used of people. Contrasted with conservative.  [PJC]

  " The term progressive is sometimes used to describe the views of a politician, where liberal might have been used at one time, in communities where the term liberal has come to connote extreme views."  [PJC]
•  Disposed toward adopting new methods in government or education, holding tolerant and liberal ideas, and generally favoring improvement in civic life; -- of towns and communities.  [PJC]

Progressive euchre or Progressive whist, a way of playing at card parties, by which after every game, the losers at the first table go to the last table, and the winners at all the tables, except the first, move up to the next table. -- Progressive muscular atrophy (Med.), a nervous disorder characterized by continuous atrophy of the muscles.

OXFORD DICTIONARY

progressive, adj. & n.
--adj.
1 moving forward (progressive motion).
2 proceeding step by step; cumulative (progressive drug use).
3 a (of a political party, government, etc.) favouring or implementing rapid progress or social reform. b modern; efficient (this is a progressive company).
4 (of disease, violence, etc.) increasing in severity or extent.
5 (of taxation) at rates increasing with the sum taxed.
6 (of a card-game, dance, etc.) with periodic changes of partners.
7 Gram. (of an aspect) expressing an action in progress, e.g. am writing, was writing.
8 (of education) informal and without strict discipline, stressing individual needs.
--n. (also Progressive) an advocate of progressive political policies.

Derivative

progressively adv. progressiveness n. progressivism n. progressivist n. & adj.

Etymology

F progressif -ive or med.L progressivus (as PROGRESS)

THESAURUS

progressive

Fabian, a la mode, advanced, advancing, ameliorative, ascending, avant-garde, axial, back, back-flowing, backward, bettering, catenary, consecutive, contemporary, continuing, continuous, descending, developing, down-trending, downward, drifting, dynamic, extremist, far out, fashionable, flowing, fluent, flying, forward, forward-looking, go-ahead, going, gradual, growing, gyrational, gyratory, improving, in, increasing, left, left of center, left-wing, left-winger, leftist, liberal, liberalist, liberalistic, lineal, linear, looking up, meliorative, meliorist, mending, mod, modern, modernistic, modernized, modish, mounting, moving, newfashioned, now, on the left, on the lift, on the mend, oncoming, ongoing, onward, ordinal, passing, plunging, present-day, present-time, proceeding, progressing, progressionist, progressist, progressivist, progressivistic, radical, reflowing, refluent, reformer, reformist, regressive, retrogressive, revisionist, revolutionary, rising, rotary, rotational, rotatory, running, rushing, sequent, sequential, serial, seriate, sideward, sinking, soaring, step by step, streaming, streamlined, successional, successive, twentieth-century, ultra-ultra, ultramodern, up-to-date, up-to-datish, up-to-the-minute, up-trending, upward, utopian, utopist, way out, welfare stater

ROGET THESAURUS

progressive

Improvement

N improvement, amelioration, melioration, betterment, mend, amendment, emendation, mending, advancement, advance, ascent, promotion, preferment, elevation, increase, cultivation, civilization, culture, march of intellect, menticulture, race-culture, eugenics, reform, reformation, revision, radical reform, second thoughts, correction, limoe labor, refinement, elaboration, purification, oxidation, repair, recovery, revise, new edition, reformer, radical, improving, progressive, improved, better, better off, better for, all the better for, better advised, reformatory, emendatory, reparatory, remedial, corrigible, improvable, accultural, on consideration, on reconsideration, on second thoughts, on better advice, ad melius inquirendum, urbent latericiam invenit marmoream reliquit.

Continuity

N continuity, consecution, consecutiveness, succession, round, suite, progression, series, train chain, catenation, concatenation, scale, gradation, course, ceaselessness, constant flow, unbroken extent, procession, column, retinue, cortege, cavalcade, rank and file, line of battle, array, pedigree, genealogy, lineage, race, ancestry, descent, family, house, line, line of ancestors, strain, rank, file, line, row, range, tier, string, thread, team, suit, colonnade, continuous, continued, consecutive, progressive, gradual, serial, successive, immediate, unbroken, entire, linear, in a line, in a row, uninterrupted, unintermitting, unremitting, unrelenting (perseverence), perennial, evergreen, constant, continuously, seriatim, in a line, in succession, in turn, running, gradually, step by step, gradatim, at a stretch, in file, in column, in single file, in Indian file.

Course

N corridors of time, sweep of time, vesta of time, course of time, progress of time, process of time, succession of time, lapse of time, flow of time, flux of time, stream of time, tract of time, current of time, tide of time, march of time, step of time, flight of time, duration, aorist, elapsing, aoristic, progressive, in due time, in due season, in in due course, in due process, in the fullness of time, in time, labitur et labetur, truditur dies die, fugaces labuntur anni, tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this.

Progression

N progress, progression, progressiveness, advancing, advance, advancement, ongoing, flood, tide, headway, march, rise, improvement, advancing, progressive, profluent, advanced, forward, onward, forth, on, ahead, under way, en route for, on one's way, on the way, on the road, on the high road, on the road to, in progress, in mid progress, in transitu, vestigia nulla retrorsum, westward the course of empire takes its way.