ism

Etymology

It is the suffix -ism used as an independent word.^[2][3][4][5] Klein calls it a back-formation from words ending in the suffix.^[6] The suffix came into Middle English as -isme, from Old French -isme, from Latin -ismus, from Ancient Greek -ισμός (-ismós),^[7][2] which formed nouns of action from verbs in -ίζειν (-ízein).^[2][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A doctrine, theory or practice with, or claiming, a distinctive character: 1680, in E. Pettit's Vision of Purgatory.^[2][5][8] Etymonline dates it to the 1670s.^[4]

Semantic evolution

Barnhart sees the noun as drawn from words such as Puritanism, Quakerism and Calvinism, and since the 1920s Communism, Capitalism and Socialism.^[5] From the start it was used chiefly with disapproval,^[2][4] and the modern dictionaries still label it informal and often derogatory.^[9][3][10] In the 19th century it gave nonce derivatives such as ismal (1840),^[11] and Chambers records ismatic, addicted to isms or faddish theories.^[12] The noun ist was formed in the same way from -ist by 1811.^[4] Merriam-Webster now also records a sense "an oppressive, especially discriminatory, attitude or belief".^[8]

Timeline

• 1680 – a distinctive doctrine, theory or practice, usually disparaging.^[2][5][8] Etymonline dates it to the 1670s.^[4]
• 1840 – nonce derivatives such as ismal.^[11]

Meanings

Noun

1. A distinctive doctrine, theory, system or practice, especially a political ideology or an artistic movement; often used with disapproval: He had no patience with the isms of his student days.^[8][3][9][7]
2. An oppressive, especially discriminatory, attitude or belief.^[8]

Related words

• -ism
• -ist
• -ize

Usage notes

In US drug slang of the 1990s, ism or izm was marijuana, a word to which Green's Dictionary of Slang gives no known etymology.^[13]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
9. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
10. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
12. ^ The Chambers Dictionary (2014), 13th ed., Edinburgh: Chambers
13. ^ Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com