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icon, iconoclast - vocabulary

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  Ed Good  —  Grammar Tips
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noun

Icon: An image, picture, likeness, or representation; an enduring symbol; a person who is the object of devotion or attention. In the computer world, a graphical image or symbol on a screen that represents an underlying file or program.

“Grilled cheese sandwich: Updating an American Icon

A grilled cheese sandwich is an ode to childhood, a purist's dream and an archetypal comfort food all at once. Just three mundane ingredients and a few minutes should be all it takes to create something downright sublime, right? So why do so few sublime ones come our way?

—Amy Scattergood Los Angeles Times, August 8, 2007

Iconoclast: One who attacks or destroys cherished beliefs or symbols. Originally, in the eighth and ninth centuries, the iconoclasts were those who literally destroyed paintings and sculptures.

You have no imagination, Ann. I am ten times more destructive now than I was then. The moral passion has taken my destructiveness in hand and directed it to moral ends. I have become a reformer, and, like all reformers, an iconoclast. I no longer break cucumber frames and burn gorse bushes: I shatter creeds and demolish idols.

—George Bernard Shaw Man and Superman (1903)

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