essential element

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Petroleum is an essential element in modern industry, whether used as a fuel, a lubricant or an ingredient in plastics and chemicals.

From Barron's • Mar. 13, 2026

But if you say you’re fighting a war on behalf of a country’s oppressed people, it’s a good idea—in fact, it is an essential element of the war strategy—to think about this problem.

From Slate • Mar. 13, 2026

It includes Sontag’s “Notes on ‘Camp,’” among whose 58 numbered observations is: “In naïve, or pure, Camp, the essential element is seriousness, a seriousness that fails.”

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 2, 2026

That essential element of his identity is presented as merely neutral fact, rather than the alienating circumstance it no doubt was.

From Los Angeles Times • Nov. 18, 2024

To deny the individual agency of those caught up in the system—their capacity to overcome seemingly impossible odds—would be to deny an essential element of their humanity.

From "The New Jim Crow" by Michelle Alexander