autotelism

  1. Noun.  The belief that an entity or event has within itself its own meaning or purpose.
  2. Noun.  (arts) In literature or art, the belief that a work, having been created, is a justification in and of itself. Poems with a unified rhetorical device to frame the poem in a singular idea.

This is an unmodified, but possibly outdated, definition from Wiktionary and used here under the Creative Commons license. Wiktionary is a great resource. If you like it too, please donate to Wikimedia.

This entry was last updated on RefTopia from its source on 3/20/2012.