seduction

Borrowed from Middle French séduction, from Latin seductio, from sēdūcō.

• (UK, Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /sɪˈdʌk.ʃn̩/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• (US, General American) IPA^(key): /sɪˈdʌk.ʃn̩/

seduction (countable and uncountable, plural seductions)

1. The act of seducing.
   • 2007 September 28, Graham Linehan, The IT Crowd, Season 2, Episode 6:

     Douglas: Well done on passing the test, Jen... Yes, all those clumsy attempts at seduction. Don't tell me you couldn't see through them. They were a test to find out whether you really wanted to work for me or whether you just wanted to come up here for my body.
     Jen: Oh, no, no, no, no, no, not at all.
     Douglas: All right.
     Jen: No, physically you're just not the sort of man I go for.
     Douglas: Yeah, thanks, Jen.
     Jen: I go for the classically good-looking men: Blond, broad, and generally clean shaven.
     Douglas: Alright, yeah, enough of the jibber-jabber!

   Seduction is the fine art of manipulating people based on physical attraction and desire. Step 1: Be attractive. Step 2: Don't be unattractive.

2. (dated, law, in English common law) The felony of, as a man, inducing a previously chaste unmarried female to engage in sexual intercourse on a promise of marriage.
3. (usually in the plural) A seductive aspect of something; appeal.
   • 2006, Matt Wray, Not Quite White, page xi:

     It is with no small degree of irony that I confess that immersing myself in an interdisciplinary project has warmed me to the seductions of disciplinary perspectives.

• hypnoseduction
• seduction theory

• seduce

• eductions, suctioned