tectonics
[= Ger. tektonik.]
1. A term for the constructive arts in general.
| 1850 J. Leitch tr. C. O. Müller's Anc. Art §22 A series of arts which form and perfect vessels, implements, dwellings, and places of assembly... We call this class of artistic activities tectonics. |
2. Geol. The structural arrangement of rocks in the earth's crust (or on another planet); the branch of geology concerned with the understanding of rock structures, esp. large-scale ones. Cf. plate tectonics s.v. plate n. 21.
| 1899 Q. Jrnl. Geol. Soc. LV. 399 (heading) The tectonics of the district. 1914 J. Park Textbk. Geol. xxxiv. 489 By a series of pressure experiments in 1888, Cadell obtained instructive imitations of the tectonics of mountain-building. 1935 [see autochthonous a.]. 1976 Daily Colonist (Victoria, B.C.) 15 May 5/5 The science of tectonics—the study of the movement of these plates—shows that Africa and Europe are in collision. 1982 Nature 28 Jan. 290 (heading) The tectonics of Ganymede. |