Definition of degradation:

• changing to a lower state ( a less respected state)
• The state of being reduced in rank, character, or reputation; baseness; moral, physical, or intellectual degeneracy; disgrace; abasement; debasement.
• A gradual wearing down or wasting, as of rocks and banks, by the action of water, frost etc.
• The state or condition of a species or group which exhibits degraded forms; degeneration.
• Arrest of development, or degeneration of any organ, or of the body as a whole.
• The act of lowering, or of being lowered, in rank, morals, etc.; disgrace.
• Act of degrading; state of being degraded; debasement; geol., a wearing away.
• The act of degrading, or the state of being degraded.
• The act of degrading; the state of being degraded; diminution or reduction of strength, excellence, or value; degeneration; a lessening and obscuring of the appearance of distant objects in a landscape; the wearing away of rocks, beaches, & c.; the action of water and other causes.
• A reducing in rank; a depriving of office or situation; baseness; in geol., a wasting or wearing down.
• Degradingly.

Usage examples for degradation

1. They may have seen, or, at least, must know of, his degradation.  A Knight Of The Nineteenth Century by E. P. Roe

2. People who can enjoy the melancholy spectacle of human nature in a state of degradation would be at a loss which exhibition to prefer- an ugly old maid in a rage, or an ugly old maid in tears.  The Legacy of Cain by Wilkie Collins

3. There was a reformatory, and that winter the American Female Guardian Society was incorporated, " to prevent vice and moral degradation;" but Mr. Brace had not yet found his life- work, and little Mary Ellen had not been born.  The Children of the Poor by Jacob A. Riis

4. It is because I have the heart of a man, I will not suffer degradation!  The Italians by Frances Elliot