progressió

Progressió is a term used in several languages, notably Catalan, to denote progress or progression in the sense of a forward sequence or arrangement. It describes a pattern that develops over time from one state to another. The word derives from Latin progressio, from pro- “forward” and gradi “to step.”

In mathematics, progressió refers to a sequence of numbers governed by a regular rule. The most common forms are the progressió aritmètica (arithmetic progression), where successive terms differ by a constant, and the progressió geomètrica (geometric progression), where each term is a constant multiple of the previous one. These concepts are foundational in algebra and number theory and appear in problems involving sums, limits, and growth rates.

In music, a progressió (harmonic progression) describes a sequence of chords that establishes tonality and drives musical motion. Progressions are analyzed in terms of function, voice leading, and cadence, and they underpin much of Western tonal harmony.

Beyond mathematics and music, progressió can be used more generally to describe the orderly development of processes, ideas, or stages over time. In fields such as linguistics, rhetoric, biology, and computer science, it may denote the sequence of steps in an experiment, the advancement of concepts, or the evolution of a system.

Overall, progressió captures the idea of forward development through an ordered arrangement, whether numbers, sounds, or steps in a process.