From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishprismpris‧m /ˈprɪzəm/ noun [countable] 1 HPOa transparent block of glass that breaks up white light into different colours2 technicalHPO a solid object with matching ends and several sides which are the same width all the way up
Examples from the Corpus
prism• Joe viewed the world through what at the time would have been considered a prism of realism.• The south side of the suture, and the Southern Uplands accretionary prism, was less highly tectonised.• Other shapes were used too, such as cones, prisms, stamps, and even animals and birds.• In the windows crystal prisms dangled so that faint rainbows stained the gauzy curtains.• All too often, a safe show in the distorted prism of network thinking is an innocuous show.• He is a decent, intelligent human being who happens to see the world through a very narrow prism.• This gives it a whitish sparkle as light catches millions of tiny prisms and reflects white light.• The results also show a significant difference in accuracy before and after adaptation when wearing prisms.Origin prism (1500-1600) Late Latin prisma, from Greek, “something cut with a saw”; because of its shape 