Meanings
- engineeringOccurring after a mechanical process has completed.
Primary sludge is generated by postmechanical treatment after the primary stage, whereas waste-activated sludge is generated via biological treatment by transformation of soluble contamination (mainly C, N, and P) into particulate biomass.
2019, Jose Antonio Olivares, Daniel Puyol, Juan Antonio Melero, Wastewater Treatment Residues as Resources for Biorefinery Products and Biofuels, page 272 more examples
Postmechanical operations include: (1) removal of excess weld metal, slag, and weld spatter, (2) rough or finish machining to dimensional requirements of the weldment, and (3) metal conditioning processes such as peening or roll planishing to reduce cracking tendencies physically and to increase weld bead strength.
1989, William Winchell, Realistic Cost Estimating for Manufacturing, page 121Industrial capitalism, in its hard metallic form, is melted away from the hard core of global capitalism […] from human labor time to postmechanical production processes where human labor is reduced to assemblage work, the wastage of which forms the assemblages of human posturban communities.
2015, Charles C. Lemert, Structural Lie: Small Clues to Global Things, page 16 - Occurring after the end of the machine age.
By 1763, he was actively wrestling with exactly the questions that we have seen repeatedly put on the table in the postmechanical age.
2022, Jonathan Sheehan, Dror Wahrman, Invisible Hands: Self-Organization and the Eighteenth Century, page 2992 more examples
As Barglow noted in the beginning of this section, how one imagines the human position in the new postmechanical age recalls performance anixeties, penetration metaphors, and phobias of the womb.
1997, Sue-Ellen Case, The Domain-Matrix, page 97Is the postmodern world. postmechanical? If the age of the machine include computers and the entire digital world, just watch postmoderns on their cell phones.
2005, D. A. Carson, Becoming Conversant with the Emerging ChurchAntonyms: premechanical
Synonyms & antonyms
adjectiveOccurring after the end of the machine age.
Origin
- Proto-Indo-European*pós
- Proto-Indo-European*pósti
- Proto-Italic*posti
- Old Latinposte
- Latinpost
- Englishpost-
- Proto-Indo-European*megʰ-der.?
- Ancient Greekμηχανή (mēkhanḗ)
- Ancient Greekμηχανικός (mēkhanikós)
- Latinmēchanicus
- Old Frenchmecanique
- Middle Englishmechanic
- Proto-Indo-European*h₂el-
- Proto-Indo-European*h₂élisder.?
- Middle Englishmechanical
- Englishmechanical
- Englishpostmechanical
From post- + mechanical.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
postmechanical. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/postmechanical
“postmechanical.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/postmechanical. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “postmechanical,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/postmechanical.
Source: postmechanical on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.