Motif

See also: Motive

Motif may refer to the following:

In creative work:

• Motif (music), a perceivable or salient recurring fragment or succession of notes
• Motif (narrative), any recurring element in a story that has symbolic significance
• Motif (visual arts), a repeated theme or pattern
• Motif (textile arts), a recurring element or fragment that, when joined together, creates a larger work
• Motif (folkloristics), a recurring element that creates recognizable patterns in folklore and folk-art traditions.

In biochemistry:

• Sequence motif, a sequence pattern of nucleotides in a DNA sequence or amino acids in a protein
• Structural motif, a pattern in a protein structure formed by the spatial arrangement of amino acids
• Network motif, patterns (sub-graphs) that recur within a network much more often than expected at random

In computing:

• Motif (widget toolkit), a graphical user interface toolkit used in software development
• Aston Motif, a range of character generators manufactured by Aston Broadcast Systems

In other uses:

• Motif (chess composition), an element of a move in the consideration of why the piece moves and how it supports the fulfillment of the problem stipulation
• Yamaha Motif, a music workstation