noun a state of nature; conformity to nature.
2. naturalism ·add. ·noun the theory that art or literature should conform to nature; realism; also, the quality, rendering, or expression of art or literature executed according to this theory.
3. naturalism ·noun the doctrine of those who deny a supernatural agency in the miracles and revelations recorded in the bible, and in spiritual influences; also, any system of philosophy which refers the phenomena of nature to a blind force or forces acting necessarily or according to fixed laws, excluding origination or direction by one intelligent will.
4. naturalism ·add. ·noun specif., the principles and characteristics professed or represented by a 19th-century school of realistic writers, notably by zola and maupassant, who aimed to give a literal transcription of reality, and laid special stress on the analytic study of character, and on the scientific and experimental nature of their observation of life.