verb

en-verb

verb (third-person singular simple present verbs, present participle verbing, simple past and past participle verbed)

verbs (present singular third-person)
verbing (participle present)
verbed (participle past)
verbed (past)
verb (infinitive)
verb (first-person present singular)
verbed (first-person past singular)
verb (present second-person singular)
verbest (archaic present second-person singular)
verbed (past second-person singular)
verbedst (archaic past second-person singular)
verbs (present singular third-person)
verbeth (archaic present singular third-person)
verbed (past singular third-person)
verb (plural present)
verbed (past plural)
verb (present subjunctive)
verbed (past subjunctive)
verb (imperative present)
verbing (participle present)
verbed (participle past)
vb. (alternative)
v. (alternative)

From Middle English verbe, directly from Latin verbum (“word, verb”), reinforced by Old French verbe, from Proto-Indo-European *werdʰo-. Doublet of verve and word.

For example, one-part versions of the proposition "The doctor pursued the lawyer" were "The doctor verbed the object," ...

1946, Rand Corporation, The Rand Paper Series:

Each sentence had the same basic structure: The subject transitive verbed the object who intransitive verbed in the location.

1964, Journal of Mathematical Psychology:

The sentence frame was Dan verbed Ben approaching the store. This sentence frame was followed in all cases by He went inside.

1998, Marilyn A. Walker, Aravind Krishna Joshi, Centering Theory in Discourse:

(linguistics, social sciences) Used as a placeholder for any verb.


absolutism

en-noun

absolutism (countable and uncountable, plural absolutisms)

First attested in 1753 (in the theological sense); attested in 1830 in the political sense. From absolute + -ism, based after French absolutisme.

The element of absolutism and prelacy was more controlling in the counsels of the rival corporation.

1859, John Gorham Palfrey, chapter IV, in History of New England, volume I, page 217:

As absolutism became more consolidated in Europe, and particularly in France, such nonabsolutist states tended to define themselves in opposition to their absolutist rivals: hence, those features of their government which differed from absolutism tended to be given special prominence.

2019, John Gascoigne, Science and the State, page 54:

(political science, sociology) The principles or practice of absolute or arbitrary government; Synonym of despotism.

աբսոլյուտիզմ

political science: absolute or arbitrary government; despotism


economics

From econom(y) + -ics, from Latin oeconomia, from Ancient Greek οἰκονομία (oikonomía, “the management of a household”).

der

Mary studied economics for five years before going into banking.

Economics is a messy discipline: too fluid to be a science, too rigorous to be an art. Perhaps it is fitting that economists’ most-used metric, gross domestic product (GDP), is a tangle too.

2013 August 3, “Boundary problems”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8847:

(social sciences) The study of resource allocation, distribution and consumption; of capital and investment; and of management of the factors of production.


queer

en-verb

queer (third-person singular simple present queers, present participle queering, simple past and past participle queered)

queers (present singular third-person)
queering (participle present)
queered (participle past)
queered (past)
qwer (alternative)

Attested since about 1510, at first in Scots. Usually taken to be from Middle Low German (Brunswick dialect) queer (“oblique, off-center”) or the related German quer (“diagonal”), from Old Saxon thwerh, from Proto-West Germanic *þwerh, from Proto-Germanic *þwerhaz, from Proto-Indo-European *terkʷ- (“to turn, twist, wind”); compare Latin torqueō, and see more at thwart. The OED argues against this due to the semantic differences and the date at which the word appears in Scots.
Began to be used to describe gay people in the late 1800s, see usage notes for more.

der

If I go, for instance, to the history of the church in Latin America, and decide to queer the history of the Jesuitic Missions, I may find that, in many ways, the missions were more sexual than Christian.

2003, Marcella Althaus-Reid, The Queer God, page 9:

Jonathan Goldberg further explores the implications of queering history in his essay in the same volume.

2006, Carla Freccero, Queer/Early/Modern, page 80:

We might say that there has been a ‘queering’ of urban studies insofar as the metropolitan lives, subcultures and social movements of gays and lesbians are now seen as valid objects of study.

2013, Mark Davidson, Deborah Martin, chapter 8, in Urban Politics: Critical Approaches, SAGE, →ISBN:

(social sciences) To reevaluate or reinterpret (a work) with an eye to sexual orientation and/or to gender, as by applying queer theory.


acephalous

en-adj

acephalous (comparative more acephalous, superlative most acephalous)

more acephalous (comparative)
most acephalous (superlative)

From French acéphale, from Ancient Greek ἀκέφαλος (aképhalos, “headless”), from ἀ- (a-, “not”) + κεφαλή (kephalḗ, “head”). By surface analysis, a- + -cephalous.

der

an acephalous society / community

[…] an Oecumenical Council is a whole, and a Body whereof the Pope, or he that presides in it in his place, is the Head[.] For there is no Acephalous Council, as M. Schelstrate speaks, that is to say, without a Head, calling that of Constance so in the Absence of the Pope.

1685, Louis Maimbourg, chapter 25, in Archibald Lovell, transl., An Historical Treatise of the Foundation and Prerogatives of the Church of Rome and of Her Bishops, London: Jos. Hindmarsh, pages 318–319:

A very brief acephalous interim followed the death of the dark Dictator.

1870, Richard Francis Burton, Letters from the Battle-Fields of Paraguay, London: Tinsley Brothers, Introductory Essay, p. 54:

(social sciences, political science, sociology) A system of society without centralised state authority, where power is welded amongst groups of community entities e.g. clans. Without a leader or chief.


primary

/ˈpɹaɪˌmɛɹi/

Borrowed from Latin prīmārius (“of the first (rank); chief, principal; excellent”), from prīmus (first; whence the English adjective prime) + -ārius (whence the English suffix -ary); compare the French primaire, primer, and premier. Doublet of premier.

bor+

In recent primaries, for example, nearly 4% of absentees were rejected in Philadelphia; 8% in Kentucky; and 20% in parts of New York City.

2020 September 14, Richard H. Pildes, “The three words that can avert an election nightmare”, in CNN:

Before Americans pick a president in November, they get to pick the candidates in a series of primaries and caucuses. […] Biden could still win New Hampshire’s primary through a write-in campaign, but the first sanctioned Democratic contest is in South Carolina in February.

2024 January 22, Zachary B. Wolf, “2024 US presidential primaries, explained”, in CNN:

(political science) A primary election; a preliminary election to select a political candidate of a political party, or the first round of a two-round election.


direct

en-adj

direct (comparative more direct, superlative most direct)

more direct (comparative)
most direct (superlative)
darect (alternative India)

/daɪ̯əˈɹɛkt/

Borrowed from Latin dīrectus, perfect passive participle of dīrigō (“straighten, direct”), from dis- (“asunder, in pieces, apart, in two”) + regō (“make straight, rule”). Compare dress. Doublet of derecho.
For the meaning development compare with Russian напра́вить (naprávitʹ, “to direct, to turn, to aim, to level, to point”), отпра́вить (otprávitʹ, “to send, to dispatch, to forward”) connected with пра́вить (právitʹ, “to govern, to rule, to drive, to steer”).

m+

direct nomination; direct legislation

(political science) Pertaining to, or effected immediately by, action of the people through their votes instead of through one or more representatives or delegates.


leviathan

leviathans (plural)
Leviathan (alternative)

→ Translingual: †Leviathan

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-leviathan.wav

From Middle English levyethan, levyathan, etc., from Late Latin leviathan, a transliteration of Biblical Hebrew לִוְיָתָן (liv'yatán).

The fact is that [Thomas] Hobbes is interested in neither, but concerned exclusively with the political structure itself, and he depicts the features of man according to the needs of the Leviathan.

1951, Hannah Arendt, “The Political Emancipation of the Bourgeoisie”, in The Origins of Totalitarianism (A Harvest/HBJ Book), new edition, San Diego, Calif., New York, N.Y.: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, published 1973, →ISBN, part 2 (Imperialism), page 140:

(political science, sometimes capitalized) The political state, especially a domineering and totalitarian one as theorized by Thomas Hobbes.


CRT

en-noun

CRT (countable and uncountable, plural CRTs)

Considering racism as a normative practice in the academy while centering the experiential perspectives of Chicana and Chicano scholars with racial and gendered microaggressions, Solórzano lays the groundwork for use of CRT in higher education scholarship.

2016, Adrienne D. Dixson, Celia K. Rousseau Anderson, Jamel K. Donnor, Critical Race Theory in Education: All God's Children Got a Song, page 184:

JANET: Martin Luther King would have been super-antiracist, but CRT progressives minimize King's accomplishments.

2021, Stephen Waters, Individuals, Journalism, and Society Epilogue-Lessons learned:

Last week, he posted on Twitter that he was the “only candidate to take action against CRT,” the “only candidate willing to fight the radical transgender agenda” and the “only candidate willing to call abortion what it is — murder.”

2022 May 9, Ted Genoways, quoting Jim Pillen, “How Trump Helped Transform Nebraska Into a Toxic Political Wasteland”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

critical race theory
critical race theory#English

(social sciences) Initialism of critical race theory.


colonize

en-verb

colonize (third-person singular simple present colonizes, present participle colonizing, simple past and past participle colonized)

colonizes (present singular third-person)
colonizing (participle present)
colonized (participle past)
colonized (past)
colonise (alternative)

2010, Daisy Hernandez, Bushra Rehman, Colonize This!: Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism, →ISBN:

What disservice would be done if issues regarding sexualities in organisations were side-lined by a heteronormative impetus to colonise queer theory?

2011, Key Concepts in Critical Management Studies, →ISBN:

For slavery aimed not only to colonize black women's bodies, sex, and sexuality, to undermine her, it sought to subvert and destroy any authentic relationship between black women and black men as well as among black women themselves.

2015, Kwok Pui-Lan, Laura E. Donaldson, Postcolonialism, Feminism and Religious Discourse, →ISBN:

[…] suggesting that organisational discourses of heteronormativity cannot fully colonise gay sexualities and genders.

2016, Nick Rumens, Queer Company: The Role and Meaning of Friendship in Gay Men's Work, →ISBN:

The burden of judgment imposed by the politics of respectability can easily colonize black minds.

2017, Christopher J. Lebron, The Making of Black Lives Matter: A Brief History of an Idea, →ISBN:

To have our grief colonized to facilitate a racist political agenda was beyond offensive.

2017 June 13, One Year After Pulse, Don't You Dare Come for Any of Us (Lambda Legal)

These award-winning works of nature writing have extended and enhanced a genre that Jamie herself has criticised, describing it as “colonised by middle-class white men”.

2021 August 23, Libby Brooks, quoting Kathleen Jamie, “Scotland’s new makar Kathleen Jamie: ‘Poetry is at the heart of our culture’”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:

(transitive, social sciences, by extension) To intrude into and take over (the autonomy, experience, social movement, etc, of a less powerful person or group); to commandeer or appropriate.


perform

perform (third-person singular simple present performs, present participle performing, simple past and past participle performed)

performs (present singular third-person)
performing (participle present)
performed (participle past)
performed (past)
perform (infinitive)
perform (first-person present singular)
performed (first-person past singular)
perform (present second-person singular)
performest (archaic present second-person singular)
performed (past second-person singular)
performedst (archaic past second-person singular)
performs (present singular third-person)
performeth (archaic present singular third-person)
performed (past singular third-person)
perform (plural present)
performed (past plural)
perform (present subjunctive)
performed (past subjunctive)
perform (imperative present)
performing (participle present)
performed (participle past)
performe (alternative)

From Middle English parformen, performen (“to perform”), from Anglo-Norman performer, parfourmer, alteration of Old French parfornir, parfurnir (“to complete, accomplish, perform”), from par- + fornir, furnir (“to accomplish, furnish”), from Frankish *frummjan (“to accomplish, furnish”), from Proto-Germanic *frumjaną, *framjaną (“to further, promote”), from Proto-Indo-European *promo- (“in front, forth”), *per- (“forward, out”). Cognate with Old High German frummen (“to do, execute, accomplish, provide”), Old Saxon frummian (“to perform, promote”), Old English fremman (“to perform, execute, carry out, accomplish”). See also frame, from. Modernly, rather than Proto-Germanic *frumjaną, associated with Latin formō, analyzable as per- + form.

representar

intransitive: to exhibit an expected pattern of behavior

perform masculinity

perform authority

Even before her seven decades as monarch began, she performed Britishness more intuitively than anyone ever had, or likely ever will again.

2022 September 9, Sophie Gilbert, “No One Performed Britishness Better Than Her Majesty”, in The Atlantic:

(social sciences) Of a social actor, to behave in certain ways.

(transitive) To behave in accordance with, and thereby in turn shape, (a social notion or role).

käyttäytyä

social science: to behave in accordance with

Individuals in societies perform all the time.

(intransitive) To behave in ways that carry meaning in social contexts.

käyttäytyä

social science: to behave in ways that carry meaning


conservative

Borrowed from Middle French conservatif, from Latin cōnservō (“to preserve”). Equivalent to conserve + -ative.

A person who favors maintenance of the status quo.

(US, Canada, social sciences) A social conservative.


conservative

en-adj

conservative (comparative more conservative, superlative most conservative)

more conservative (comparative)
most conservative (superlative)

George Soros remains a favorite target of conservative conspiracy theorists, seeing his corrupting influence behind every liberal movement and within every nook and cranny.

2020 November 18, Brian Lowry, “‘Soros’ looks at the life and activism of the right’s favorite bogeyman”, in CNN:

(US, Canada, economics, politics, social sciences) Supporting some combination of fiscal, political or social conservatism.

مُحَافِظ

supporting fiscal, political or social conservatism


trans

en-verb

trans (third-person singular simple present transes, present participle transing, simple past and past participle transed)

transes (present singular third-person)
transing (participle present)
transed (participle past)
transed (past)

Clipping of transgender or transsexual (ultimately from Latin trāns).

[…] as they interact with bodies transing gender (and other) borders and spaces.

2012, Trystan Cotten, Transgender Migrations: The Bodies, Borders, and Politics of Transition, →ISBN:

Although they did so in sometimes very different ways and in different communities, transsexuals, drag queens, butch lesbians, cross-dressers, feminine men, and masculine women all in some senses crossed, or transed, gender[.] […] People who trans gender as well as people who do not may receive cis-privileges, and people who do not intentionally trans gender as well as people who do are denied cis-privileges if they fail to pass (or pass enough) in the sex/gender they are expected to be.

2012, Finn Enke, Transfeminist Perspectives in and beyond Transgender and Gender Studies, →ISBN, pages 4 and 20:

(transitive, chiefly humorous or social sciences) To cause to cross from one side to another of (gender, sex or similar).


kakistocracy

kakistocracies (plural)
cacistocracy (alternative)

From Ancient Greek κάκιστος (kákistos, “worst”), superlative of κακός (kakós, “bad”) + -κρατία (-kratía, “power, rule, government”) (corresponding to -cracy). The word was used, perhaps re-coined, by the English author Thomas Love Peacock (1785–1866) in his 1829 novella The Misfortunes of Elphin as the opposite of aristocracy (see second quotation).

der

Therefore we need not make any scruple of praying against […] those restlesse spirits who can no longer live, then be stickling and medling; who are stung with a perpetuall itch of changing and innovating, transforming our old Hierarchy into a new Presbytery, and this againe into a newer Independency; and our well-temperd Monarchy into a mad kinde of Kakistocracy.

1644, Paul Gosnold, A sermon preached at the publique fast the ninth day of Aug. 1644 at St. Maries, Oxford, Early English Books Online:

The people lived in darkness and vassalage. […] they were utterly destitute of the blessing of those "schools for all," the house of correction, and the treadmill, wherein the autochthonal justice of our agrestic kakistocracy now castigates the heinous sins which were then committed with impunity, […]

1829, [Thomas Love Peacock], “The Education of Taliesin”, in The Misfortunes of Elphin, London: Published by Thomas Hookham, Old Bond Street, →OCLC, pages 92–93:

Is ours a "government of the people, by the people, for the people," or a Kakistocracy rather, for the benefit of knaves at the cost of fools?

1876 January 19, James Russell Lowell, “To Joel Benton”, in Charles Eliot Norton, editor, Letters of James Russell Lowell, volume II, part I, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, publishers, published 1894, →OCLC, page 159:

Thus, the problem was not whether corruption/power abuse was allowed, but how to keep a balance between uprightness and kakistocracy.

1999, Gang Deng, “Trinary Structure: Origin, Tension and Equilibrium”, in The Premodern Chinese Economy: Structural Equilibrium and Capitalist Sterility (Routledge Explorations in Economic History), London, New York, N.Y.: Routledge, →ISBN, page 159:

Some nation-states have suffered what the Greeks called kakistocracy—government by the worst of men. International law can, in theory if not always in practice, keep these kakistocracies from damaging too much.

2000, Tom H. Hastings, Ecology of War & Peace: Counting the Cost of Conflict, Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, →ISBN, page 101:

As we step into this world—as we enter the age of kakistocracy—we should remember one thing. This isn’t a departure from [Donald] Trump's populism. It's the foundation of it. This is what Trump campaigned on.

2016 November 18, Jamelle Bouie, “Government by the worst men”, in Slate, archived from the original on 2017-01-23:

So is there a way out of the grim place we’re in? What I believe is that while resentment can put bad people in power, in the long run it can’t keep them there. At some point the public will realize that most politicians railing against elites actually are elites in every sense that matters and start to hold them accountable for their failure to deliver on their promises. And at that point the public may be willing to listen to people who don’t try to argue from authority, don’t make false promises, but do try to tell the truth as best they can. We may never recover the kind of faith in our leaders — belief that people in power generally tell the truth and know what they’re doing — that we used to have. Nor should we. But if we stand up to the kakistocracy — rule by the worst — that’s emerging as we speak, we may eventually find our way back to a better world.

2024 December 9, Paul Krugman, “My Last Column: Finding Hope in an Age of Resentment”, in New York Times:

(political science) Government under the control of a nation's worst or least-qualified citizens.

The Misfortunes of Elphin
Thomas Love Peacock


empiricism

en-noun

empiricism (countable and uncountable, plural empiricisms)

ἐμπειρῐκή

practice of medicine founded on experience only

(social sciences, political science, sociology) Research methodology shaped from empirical philosophy (see above), e.g. surveys, statistics, etc.


interact

Inasmuch as it is impossible to analyze the contents of an entire interpersonal relationship, it is helpful to conceptualize a given communication event as consisting of a series of subevents. Any one subevent may be pulled out as a basic unit for analysis in the study of interpersonal communication; this basic unit may then be called an interact. […] each interact is a distinctive attempt to conceal, repeat, or disclose information and/or to influence the relationship.

1975, Ralph Webb, Jr., chapter 1, in Interpersonal Speech Communication: Principles and Practices, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, pages 23–24:

As they listened to groups communicate, Fisher and his coworkers noted what each group member said (labeled a speech act) and how the next person responded. This pairing of speech acts is called an interact.

1991, Michael Z. Hackman, Craig E. Johnson, chapter 6, in Leadership: A Communication Perspective, Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, page 123:

(social sciences) A pair or series of acts involving more than one person.


deshopper

The deshopper is “stealing beauty” and robbing the product of some of its undetectable essence, without losing the quality of newness which is required for the product to remain returnable.

1999, Ruth A. Schmidt et al., “Deshopping – the art of illicit consumption”, in International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, →DOI:

They are the deshoppers - a scam that has cost stores £63million this year.

2004 December 8, “Deshoppers Make Returns”, in Metro:

[…] there is almost no actual control over the behaviour as none of the deshoppers interviewed had ever been caught.

2006, Tamira King, Charles Dennis, “Unethical consumers: Deshopping behaviour using the qualitative analysis of theory of planned behaviour and accompanied (de)shopping”, in Qualitative Market Research, →DOI:

(chiefly UK, social sciences) A person who practises deshopping.


salience

salience (countable and uncountable, plural saliences)

(social sciences, linguistics) Relative importance based on context.


social engineering

Madness, from this point of view, is not finally a medical phenomenon at all, but a phenomenon of social engineering, manipulation, and coercion, and of the politically motivated labeling of deviant behavior.

1995, Daniel Berthold-Bond, Hegel's Theory of Madness, →ISBN, page 179:

From one perspective, much of what goes on in every society's day-to-day operations qualifies as social engineering. One can view child rearing, schooling, military indoctrination and any other means of mobilizing bias as social engineering without doing violence to the concept.

1996, Adam Podgórecki, Jon Alexander, Rob Shields, Social Engineering, →ISBN, page 9:

China's Golden Shield has long been a byword for internet censorship. Although easily circumvented, its main purpose is to encourage citizens' self-censorship, a large-scale social engineering project of some success.

2010 January 13, Tim Stevens, “China's cyberwar goes beyond Google”, in The Guardian:

There are certain types of social engineering that represent possible dangers. For example, you may not be aware that your ideas are being intentionally manipulated and, on another level, the manipulation itself could be dangerous.

2013, Brian Taylor, No More Suffering Fools, →ISBN, page 175:

(political science) Efforts to influence attitudes and social behaviors on a large scale, in order to produce desired characteristics in a target population.

社會工程 /社会工程

efforts to influence attitudes and social behaviors on a large scale


Balkanization

Balkanization (countable and uncountable, plural Balkanizations)

Balkanizations (plural)
balkanization (alternative)
Balkanisation (alternative)

From Balkan + -ization. The term is a reference to the conflicts that the Balkan peninsula experienced in the 20th century.

(historical, chiefly political science) The fragmentation of a geopolitical region into several small states that are often hostile or non-cooperative with each other.

بَلْقَنَة

fragmentation of a region into several small states


polity

polity (countable and uncountable, plural polities)

From Middle French politie, from Latin polītīa, from Ancient Greek πολιτεία (politeía, “polity, policy, the state”). Doublet of policy and police.

der

New polities emerged in Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire.

(political science, countable) A politically organized unit, especially a nation of people, a class or ingroup that governs it, or the state ruled thereby.


rollback

en-noun

rollback (countable and uncountable, plural rollbacks)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-rollback.wav

The noun is a deverbal from roll back. The verb is a back-formation from the noun despite being redundant to roll back.

During the 1990s the Pope, who played such a central role in the rollback of communism, was one of the few international figures who could be heard speaking out against the new capitalist order.

2004 December 16, Seumas Milne, “The struggle is no longer against religion, but within it”, in The Guardian:

Politically, Brzezinski was a centrist, or conservative, Democrat. He criticised both the Eisenhower administration’s “rollback” policy towards communism in Europe, and the Nixon-Kissinger detente.

2017 May 28, Godfrey Hodgson, “Zbigniew Brzezinski obituary”, in The Guardian:

(political science) The strategy of forcing a change in the major policies of a state, usually by replacing its ruling regime, or by totally annihilating an enemy's armed forces and occupying the country, as was done in World War II to Italy, Germany, and Japan.


rekey

en-verb

rekey (third-person singular simple present rekeys, present participle rekeying, simple past and past participle rekeyed)

rekeys (present singular third-person)
rekeying (participle present)
rekeyed (participle past)
rekeyed (past)

(social sciences) To change the key or tenor of; to reframe.


discourse

en-noun

discourse (countable and uncountable, plural discourses)

discourses (plural)
discours (alternative obsolete)

non-rhotic, without the horse–hoarse merger

From Middle English discours, borrowed from Middle French discours (“conversation, speech”), from Latin discursus (“the act of running about”), from Latin discurrō (“run about”), from dis- (“apart”) + currō (“run”). Spelling modified by influence of Middle French cours (“course”). Doublet of discursus.

der

Furthermore, it should be recalled from the previous chapter that criminological discourse of the 1930s deemed every woman a potential criminal, implicitly including the domestic woman.

2007, Christine L. Marran, Poison Woman: Figuring Female Transgression in Modern Japanese Culture, page 137:

But equally important to the emergence of uniquely African-American queer discourses is the refusal of African-American movements for liberation to address adequately issues of sexual orientation and gender identity.

2008, Jane Anna Gordon, Lewis Gordon, A Companion to African-American Studies, page 308:

Brown University's Friday Night Jews (FNJ) [...] began as an informal Shabbat dinner gathering in 2016, as a space for Jewish students who were feeling fed up with Hillel’s limitations regarding Israel/Palestine discourse, after the Brown/RISD Hillel rescinded sponsorship of a film screening by the Israeli nonprofit Zochrot, an organization that educates Jewish Israelis about the Nakba.

2019 July 3, Jess Schwalb, “Red Line Rebellion”, in Jewish Currents:

(social sciences, countable) An institutionalized way of thinking, a social boundary defining what can be said about a specific topic (after Michel Foucault).


environmentalist

As we remarked once before, there are two extreme views with respect to life, one attributing everything to the environment, the other to inherent abilities. If, for example, an unusual number of distinguished men are born and reared in the same locality, the environmentalists assert that the causes for their appearance were entirely external and that had their parents changed habitats with those residing elsewhere the result would have been the same, except that the family names of these eminent men would have been different.

1926, Clark Wissler, The Relation of Nature to Man in Aboriginal America, published 1971, pages 211–212:

(anthropology, social sciences) One who holds the view that environment, rather than heredity or culture, is the primary factor in the development of an individual or group.


demos

From Ancient Greek δῆμος (dêmos, “ordinary citizens, common people from a district, in a city-state”).

uder

When the demos took charge, law and order inevitably collapsed, or so they concluded.

2007, Tim Blanning, The Pursuit of Glory, Penguin, published 2008, page 323:

(political science, singular or plural) The ordinary citizens of an ancient Greek city-state; hence, the common populace of a state or district (especially a democratic one); the people.


spoiler effect

Coordinate term: Nader effect

(voting theory, political science) A situation where a losing alternative affects the results of some competition, such as a sporting event or election.


decolonization

en-noun

decolonization (countable and uncountable, plural decolonizations)

decolonizations (plural)
decolonisation (alternative)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-decolonization.wav

But what does decolonisation have to do with place names? Place names are the meeting points of history and geography that shape part of our identities.

2019, Nalini Mohabir, “Renaming the Cook Islands would be a vital step towards true independence”, in Guardian.:

(social sciences) The reverse of colonization, i.e. granting back autonomy to a group.


longitudinal

/ˌlɒŋɡɪˈtjuːdɪnəl/

/ˌlɔŋɡɪˈt͡ʃʉwdɪnəl/

/ˌlɒŋd͡ʒəˈtudənəl/

/lɔŋɡəˈt͡ʃʉːdənəl/

/lɒŋɡəˈt͡ʃʉːdənəl/

From Middle English longitudinal, from Latin longitūdin-, oblique stem of longitūdō (“length, longitude”). By surface analysis, longitude + -in- + -al.

surf

longitudinal studies

Examining national longitudinal data, Mossakowski has found that people who were unemployed for long periods in their teens or early 20s are far more likely to develop a habit of heavy drinking (five or more drinks in one sitting) by the time they approach middle age.

2010 March 1, Don Peck, “How a New Jobless Era Will Transform America”, in The Atlantic:

(sciences and social sciences, of a study) Sampling data over time rather than merely once.


environmentalism

en-noun

environmentalism (countable and uncountable, plural environmentalisms)

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The first is that the present work in no sense represents a relapse toward the old environmentalism which believed it could find the causes of culture in environment.

1939, Alfred L. Kroeber, “Objectives”, in Cultural and Natural Areas of Native North America, published 1963, page 1:

(medicine, social sciences) A theory that views environment, rather than heredity or culture, as the important factor in the development of an individual or group.


colonization

colonization (countable and uncountable, plural colonizations)

colonizations (plural)
colonisation (alternative UK)

(social sciences) The process of colonizing or taking over.


subaltern

From Middle French subalterne, from Late Latin subalternus, from Latin sub- + alternus, from alter.

Young refers sardonically to the existence of reams of postcolonial "theory", and promises to give us "postcolonialism from below, which is what and where it should rightly be, given that it elaborates a politics of ‘the subaltern’, that is, subordinated classes and peoples".

2003 August 9, Steven Poole, “Postcolonialism and all that jazz”, in The Guardian:

In Ghosh's novel, a canonical western scientist is pitted against a counterscientific group of native folk-medicine practitioners led by Mangala, a subaltern in every conceivable meaning of the term.

2012, Aparajita De, Amrita Ghosh, Ujjwal Jana, Subaltern Vision: A Study in Postcolonial Indian English Text, page 109:

(social sciences, literary theory) A member of a group that is socially, politically and geographically outside of the hegemonic power structure of the colony and of the colonial homeland.

siirtomaa-alamainen

member of a group outside a hegemonic power structure


involution

involution (countable and uncountable, plural involutions)

(economics, social sciences, of a society or nation) A cessation of development or progress despite intense inner competition.

內卷 /内卷

a cessation of development or progress despite intense inner competition


operationalize

en-verb

operationalize (third-person singular simple present operationalizes, present participle operationalizing, simple past and past participle operationalized)

operationalizes (present singular third-person)
operationalizing (participle present)
operationalized (participle past)
operationalized (past)
operationalise (alternative)

/ɒpəˈɹeɪʃ(ə)nəlʌɪz/

/ˌɑpəˈɹeɪʃənəˌlaɪz/

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-operationalize.wav

To operationalize a concept is to identify those variables in terms of which the phenomenon represented by the concept can be accurately observed.

1956, Ernest Greenwood, “New Directions in Delinquency Research: A Commentary on a Study by Bernard Lander”, in Social Service Review, volume 30, number 2, page 152:

Vision seems ‘childishly simple’ to us but proves to be fiendishly hard to operationalise, precisely because we are so good at it.

2012, Adam Zeman, ‘Only Connect’, Literary Review, number 399:

General vocabulary is often defined as a common core of English words and operationalized as the most frequent words in a balanced and representative corpus of English.

2018, Clarence Green, James Lambert, “Advancing disciplinary literacy through English for academic purposes: Discipline-specific wordlists, collocations and word families for eight secondary subjects”, in Journal of English for Academic Purposes, volume 35, →DOI, page 107:

(transitive, social sciences) To define (a concept) in such a way that it can be practically measured.


disenchantment

en-noun

disenchantment (countable and uncountable, plural disenchantments)

From dis- + enchantment. In the social sciences sense a calque of German Entzauberung, as used by sociologist Max Weber.

Blumenberg's thesis, which has since been reiterated by a number of philosophers and historians, is that nominalism, as it became widespread in Protestant theology, led to the Enlightenment, disenchantment, and the scientific revolution.

2021, Meghan O'Gieblyn, chapter 11, in God, Human, Animal, Machine […] , →ISBN:

(in particular, social sciences) The devaluation of religion or mysticism apparent in modern society.


longitudinally

en-adv

longitudinally (comparative more longitudinally, superlative most longitudinally)

more longitudinally (comparative)
most longitudinally (superlative)

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(sciences and social sciences) By sampling data over time rather than merely once.


biokinesis

(political science) A political theory concerning the movement of populations as a basis for power.


SDR

en-noun

SDR (countable and uncountable, plural SDRs)

(social sciences) Initialism of socially desirable responding.


participatory democracy

participatory democracy (countable and uncountable, plural participatory democracies)

(political science) A form of government in which citizens participate individually and directly in political decisions and policies affecting their lives, rather than through elected representatives.


functionalism

functionalism (countable and uncountable, plural functionalisms)

/ˈfʌŋkʃənəlɪzəm/

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-functionalism.wav

(social sciences) The idea that social and cultural cohesion are a function of the interdependence and interactions of the institutions of a society.


queering

queering (countable and uncountable, plural queerings)

(LGBTQ, social sciences) The process by which something is queered.


divine right

the divine right (canonical)
divine right of kings (alternative)

(Christianity, political science, philosophy) The Christian doctrine that monarchs have a God-given right to rule, that they are answerable only to God, and that rebellion is sinful.


technoscience

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-technoscience.wav

Briefly put, strategies of globalization undertaken by the state, capital and technoscience all attempt to negotiate the production of locality in a non place- based way that induces increasingly delocalizing effects.

2002, Ginette Verstraete, Tim Cresswell, Mobilizing Place, Placing Mobility: The Politics of Representation in a Globalized World, Rodopi, page 20:

Technoscience, when well directed, can produce important means of improving the quality of human life, from useful domestic appliances to great transportation systems, bridges, buildings and public spaces.

2015, Pope Francis I, Laudato Si': Encyclical Letter on care for our common home:

(philosophy, social sciences) The study of the technological and social context of science.


emic

en-adj

emic (comparative more emic, superlative most emic)

more emic (comparative)
most emic (superlative)

Coined by American linguist Kenneth Pike in 1954 from phonemic.
* Kenneth Lee Pike (1982) Linguistic Concepts: An Introduction to Tagmemics, page 44: “Generalizing from phonemics, I coined the term emic in 1954.”

coin

A useful example of the emic-etic distinction may be made by comparing the concept “waves on the ocean or sea” from the perspective of a European American with that of a Truk Islander […] The proposed etics here might be that both cultures understand the use of waves as vehicles for surfing and as movement reflecting the transfer of energy […] certain differences, or emics exist, for European Americans the waves may be sources of beauty — the Truk Islander has learned to use them […] as a road map.

1996, Advanced Methodological Issues in Culturally Competent Evaluation for Substance Abuse Prevention:

In contemporary Anglophone usage, the term 'dhow' has come to refer generically and exonymically to traditional wooden vessels of the western Indian Ocean, whatever their particular forms or emic classification.

2015, John P. Cooper, Dionisius A. Agius, Tom Collie, Faisal al-Naimi, “Boat and ship engravings at al-Zubārah, Qatar: the dāw exposed?”, in Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies, volume 45: Papers from the forty-eighth meeting of the Seminar for Arabian Studies held at the British Museum, London, 25 to 27 July 2014 (2015), →ISSN, pages 35–47:

(social sciences, anthropology) Of or pertaining to the analysis of a cultural system or its features from the perspective of a participant in that culture.


etic

en-adj

etic (comparative more etic, superlative most etic)

more etic (comparative)
most etic (superlative)

Coined by American linguist Kenneth Pike in 1954 from phonetic.
* Kenneth Lee Pike (1962) With Heart and Mind: A Personal Synthesis of Scholarship and Devotion, page 37: “I have coined the term etic to refer to the detached observer’s view […]”

(social sciences, anthropology) Of or pertaining to analysis of a culture from a perspective situated outside all cultures.


constructionism

en-noun

constructionism (countable and uncountable, plural constructionisms)

But is it one constructionism in many guises, or a variety of quite different constructionisms, or merely old issues dressed up in new jargon,

1997, Derek Edwards, Discourse and Cognition, page 51:

The futility of dismissing social constructionism in favor of some "real," authentic nature outside the social and linguistic.

2018, Nicole Seymour, Bad Environmentalism, page 134:

(social sciences) The idea that people learn about, or perceive the world by constructing mental models.


Wizard of Oz

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
Wizard of Oz (character)

The name of a character from the 1900 book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum, or any of its adaptations, about the journey of Dorothy through the magical Land of Oz in search of a way home.

The goal of Neimo is to provide designers with a "Wizard of Oz" environment to observe and evaluate how users interact with multimodal interfaces.

1992, Wayne D. Gray, William E. Hefley, Dianne Murray, “NEIMO, A MULTIMODAL WIZARD OF OZ PLATFORM”, in Proceedings of the 1993 International Workshop on ..., page 204:

Once a preliminary application design is complete, a wizard-of-oz study can help test and refine the interface.

2006, E. K. Brown, Anne Anderson, Encyclopedia of Language & Linguistics, volume 11, page 769:

A Wizard of Oz prototype is an incomplete system that a designer can simulate "behind a curtain" (usually by taking the place of a recognizer) while observing the reactions of real end users (see Figure 1).

2007, Proceedings of the ACM Symposium on User Interface Software ..., page 119:

(engineering, social sciences, usually attributive) A person simulating the operation of a supposed intelligent device, usually in an experiment.


eventing

eventing (usually uncountable, plural eventings)

The corollary of this, as Whorf points out, is that thinkings and feelings to do with 'eventings' in the world are located there, out in the world in which the eventing takes place - as a natural part of the whole into which they are interwoven.

1993, John Shotter, Conversational Realities: Constructing Life Through Language:

(social sciences, rare) The occurrence of an event.


decolonize

en-verb

decolonize (third-person singular simple present decolonizes, present participle decolonizing, simple past and past participle decolonized)

decolonizes (present singular third-person)
decolonizing (participle present)
decolonized (participle past)
decolonized (past)

Across Ukraine, officials are starting projects to, as they say, “decolonize” their cities. Streets and subway stops whose names evoke the history of the Russian Empire or the Soviet Union are under scrutiny by a population eager to rid itself of traces of the nation that invaded in late February.

2022 June 7, Erika Solomon, “Goodbye, Tchaikovsky and Tolstoy: Ukrainians look to ‘decolonize’ their streets.”, in The New York Times:

The arrival of Trump in the White House gave a new urgency to the idea that museums needed to “decolonize” their collections, atone for their past elitism, and become overtly political institutions rather than mere warehouses of valuable objects.

2022 October 3, Helen Lewis, “The Guggenheim’s Scapegoat”, in The Atlantic, →ISSN:

(transitive, social sciences) To reverse the colonization of, i.e. to grant back autonomy to a group.


hyperinnovation

(social sciences, business) A successful introduction and interconnection of novel ideas.


underresourced

en-adj

underresourced (comparative more underresourced, superlative most underresourced)

more underresourced (comparative)
most underresourced (superlative)
under-resourced (alternative)

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Who was being served when mainstream media coverage focused on President Clinton's personal life rather than on issues in underresourced communities?

2000, Steven R. Goldzwig, Patricia A. Sullivan, “Electronic Democracy, Virtual Politics, and Local Communities”, in Robert E. Denton, editor, Political Communication Ethics: An Oxymoron?, page 68:

(social sciences, public health) Having insufficient resources; poor or underfunded.


microanalysis

en-noun

microanalysis (countable and uncountable, plural microanalyses)

(social sciences) the analysis of individual or community social activity e.g. family relationships.


non-intervention

non-intervention (countable and uncountable, plural non-interventions)

non-interventions (plural)
nonintervention (alternative)

(political science) The policy of a state of not intervening in the domestic affairs of another.


shadow government

shadow government (plural shadow governments)

The origin of such terms (e.g., shadow government, shadow cabinet, shadow minister, shadow portfolio) lies in the figurative metaphor of a shadow (shade) following its source object closely and in well-defined parallel. But conspiracy theorists have longed seized upon the way it sounds nefarious, as if it were meant to connote dark and sinister forces. This interpretation is also encouraged by disinformation purveyors seeking to sow societal disruption.

Meronyms: shadow cabinet, shadow minister

Cuba's two most important exile groups, after months of quarreling, met last week to form a shadow government dedicated to the liberation of their homeland.

1961 March 31, “Getting Ready”, in Time Magazine, page 24:

(political science) A government that is prepared to take control in response to certain events, especially one made up of the leadership of the largest opposition party in parliament which would assume control should the ruling party be displaced in elections.

skaduregering

government-in-waiting that is prepared to take control

conspiracy theorized
conspiracy theorized

(political science) A (real or conspiracy theorized) body of private individuals who exercise actual power behind the scenes instead of a country's or organization's public figures.


just-so story

/ˌd͡ʒʌstˈsəʊ ˌstɔːɹi/

PIE word
 *swé
From just so (“(almost) exactly or precisely like something”, adjective) + story, referring to the series of short stories called Just So Stories (collected in book form in 1902) by the English writer Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) which described how various animals acquired their distinctive characteristics, such as how the leopard got its spots. According to Kipling, the stories were so titled because they were intended to put his daughter Josephine (“Effie”) to sleep, “and you were not allowed to alter those by one single little word. They had to be told just so; or Effie would wake up and put back the missing sentence.”

Sociobiological explanations of human behaviour encounter two special difficulties, suggesting that a Darwinian model may be generally inapplicable in this case. […] Secondly, the standard foundation of Darwinian just-so stories does not apply to humans. That foundation is the implication: if adaptive, then genetic—for the inference of adaptation is usually the only basis of a selective story, and Darwinism is a theory of genetic change and variation in populations.

1978 November 16, Stephen Jay Gould, “Sociobiology: The Art of Storytelling”, in Bernard Dixon, editor, New Scientist, volume 80, number 1129, London: IPC Magazines, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 532:

(social sciences, especially anthropology, philosophy, chiefly derogatory) An untestable explanation for something, such as a form of behaviour, a biological trait, or a cultural practice.


panarchy

panarchy (countable and uncountable, plural panarchies)

From pan- + -archy. Coined independently in many different contexts.

The overlapping governance networks of panarchy have facilitated a context conducive to the above competing multilateralisms.

2006, W.A. Knight, “Plurilateral Multilateralism: Canada's Emerging International Policy?”, in Andrew F. Cooper, Dane Rowlands, editors, Canada Among Nations, →ISBN, page 100:

(political science) An inclusive, multilateral system in which all parties may participate meaningfully.


nation-building

Although uniquely favored by relatively viable political institutions, India yet shares this uncertainty with a large number of countries for which independence is but a first step on the road to nation-building.

1977, Reinhard Bendix, Nation-building and Citizenship: Studies of Our Changing Social Order, Univ of California Press, →ISBN, page 357:

The mythologizing, carried out over many decades, granted Italian-Americans “a formative role in the nation-building narrative.”

2019 October 12, Brent Staples, quoting Danielle Battisti, “How Italians Became ‘White’”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(political science) Unifying the people or peoples within a state so that it remains politically stable and viable in the long run.


qualitative research

(social sciences, marketing) A set of research techniques in which data is obtained from a relatively small group of respondents and not analyzed with statistical techniques.

kvalitativní výzkum

techniques not relying on statistical analysis


ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny

Reportedly coined by zoologist Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919).

With reference to seedling stages the statement that ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny must be made with great reserve.

1905, J. A. Harris, "The Importance of Investigations of Seedling Stages," Science, New Series, vol. 22, no. 554, p. 186

Haeckel maintained that ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny, and this idea was incorporated by Lombroso into his parallelism between the criminal and the child.

1961, M. E. Wolfgang, “Pioneers in Criminology: Cesare Lombroso (1835-1909)”, in The Journal of Criminal Law, Criminology, and Police Science, volume 52, number 4, page 367:

For even if we accept that "ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny," those responsible for the drafting of ancient legal documents were not children, and are hardly to be endowed with some form of infantile mentality.

2002, B. S. Jackson, “Models in Legal History: The Case of Biblical Law”, in Journal of Law and Religion, volume 18, number 1, page 11:

(biology, social sciences, art, philosophy) The physical, cultural, moral, or intellectual development of each individual passes through stages similar to the developmental stages of that individual's species, society, or civilization. Not taken literally since the late 19th century.


term limit

Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution

Attorney Gordon cites no authority for his interpretation of the Twenty-Second Amendment, which is contrary to the Amendment's plain meaning. Application of the term limit turns on whether an individual has actually been elected President twice, not on beliefs or assertions about that fact. Cf. Nader v. Butz, 398 F. Supp. 390, 397 (D.D.C. 1975) ("Having been elected to [the presidency] twice, [Richard Nixon] is precluded from serving again.") That Mr. Trump has falsely asserted that he won the 2020 election is no more disqualifiying than it would be for him to proclaim that he is not a United States citizen. In other words, political grandstanding does not trigger the bar of the Twenty-Second Amendment.

2023 December 28, Shenna Bellows, “Ruling of the Secretary of State”, in State of Maine Secretary of State, archived from the original on 2023-12-29, page 15:

(politics, political science) The maximum number of terms that a person may legally serve in a particular elected office.


neorealism

neorealism (usually uncountable, plural neorealisms)

international relations
international relations

(political science) A theory of international relations based on the idea that power is the most important factor.


homophily

In this research we explore whether homophily as an organizing principle affects the performance of immigrant entrepreneurs in Germany.

2007, Leo Paul Dana, Handbook of Research on Ethnic Minority Entrepreneurship: A Co-evolutionary View on Resource Management, Edward Elgar Publishing, →ISBN, page 511:

Homophily is the tendency for there to be higher rates of contact between similar people than between dissimilar people. It is the social process reflected in that old bit of folk wisdom: “Birds of a feather flock together.”

2009, John M Levine, Michael A. Hogg, Encyclopedia of Group Processes and Intergroup Relations, SAGE Publications, →ISBN, page 404:

(social sciences) The tendency of individuals to associate with others of the same kind.


psychographic

Another suggestion was to create psychographic profiles of target readers, then display large photographs of archetypes around the newsroom, to remind reporters of the public for whom they toiled.

1988 August 5, Michael Miner, “End of Page?; Writers in the Sky; Arts Smarts”, in Chicago Reader:

(social sciences) Based on individual psychological characteristics, rather than demographic or other factors,


non-rational

In the nature of things there must be causes that explain why an industrial enterprise—mill, factory, foundry, dairy, refinery—is located at just this or that place, and not somewhere else. Some of these causes are non-rational, such as accident and caprice. . . . The remaining causes are rational and economic; that is, the selected locality is deemed to offer certain advantages in production or marketing.

1896, Edward A. Ross, “The Location of Industries”, in The Quarterly Journal of Economics, volume 10, number 3, page 247:

(economics, social sciences, public policy) Not based on one's own interests; inconsistent with utility maximization.


rekeying

rekeying (countable and uncountable, plural rekeyings)

(social sciences) The process of changing the key or tenor of something; a reframing.


cyberdiscourse

cyberdiscourse (countable and uncountable, plural cyberdiscourses)

On the other hand, while net communities are virtually interconnected, cyberdiscourse is not exempted from parochialism.

2003, George W Noblit, Beth Hatt-Echeverria, The future of educational studies:

Cyberdiscourse is rich in imperial metaphors figuring the early days of cyberspace as the "frontier" or "Wild West".

2004, Stephen Cairns, Drifting: architecture and migrancy:

Cyberdiscourses also join forces with the latest developments of informatic theories, technoscience hermeneutics, and cyberfeminist agendas...

2006, Kin-yuen Wong, Gary Westfahl, Amy Kit-sze Chan, World weavers: globalization, science fiction, and the cybernetic revolution:

(social sciences) Discourse (institutionalised thinking) in cyberspace.


macroanalysis

macroanalysis (countable and uncountable, plural macroanalyses)

(social sciences) the analysis of the highest levels of social activity e.g. social stratification.


microgenesis

The term microgenesis has been proposed for the continuous formative activity which underlies cognition.

1975, American Handbook of Psychiatry: Organic Disorder and Psychosomatic Medicine, page 272:

Goldberg (1985) has proposed that the SMA is part of a medial system which is crucial in the programming and fluent execution of movements on the basis of internal models of reality. He hypothesized that there are two stages in the microgenesis of movement, each stage being a loop consisting of a number of cortical and subcortical structures. The first stage involves the selection of a context-appropriate behavioral strategy, and the second involves the specification of the details required to execute the action.

1990, G. Jason, Geoffrey Hammond, Cerebral Control of Speech and Limb Movements, page 154:

[...] the gesture is highly conventionalized, a formal linguistic sign in and of itself requiring no verbal representation to be understood (for example, when a young child is told to 'wave bye bye'). McNeill (1992) believes that there are different qualities that accompany this continuum in relation to the microgenesis of an utterance, stating that at the beginning there is a 'spontaneous' use of gestures which is connected with the germination of a thought, while the use of conventionalized gestures corresponds to the final stages of the thought process.

1995, Cornell Working Papers in Linguistics: Volumes 13-15, page 104:

Like in action where one should execute the movements or responses one at a time (and it is physically impossible to do it otherwise, circus practices notwithstanding), microgenesis tends to solve one or another subtask at different stages of its unfolding. In high-level activity, particular efferent operations often unfold as more or less arbitrary segments in a continuous flow of actions. [...] Can you tell the exact moment when a ball-toss ends and the strike for the serve begins in tennis? Not so easily. Similarly, in microgensis, stages unfold as somewhat arbitrarily isolable epochs in a continuous flow of percept genesis.

2000, Talis Bachmann, Microgenetic Approach to the Conscious Mind, page 200:

The intention of this paper is to open up a dialogue on the wider implications of microgenesis, particularly as it applies to the process-relational view of intersubjectivity.

2008, Mark Germine, The microgenesis of antisociality: a process-relational perspective, which is chapter 6 of Neuropsychology and Philosophy of Mind in Process: Essays in Honor of Jason Brown, beginning on page 144 of that book

(social sciences technical jargon) The development, in discrete but generally imperceptible (seemingly continuous) increments, by the human body or brain, of thoughts, motions, or actions.


social class

(social sciences) A class of people, based on social power, wealth or another criterion.


biopower

From bio- + power, calque of French biopouvoir, coined by Michel Foucault.

The third type of power, biopower, emerges from the eighteenth century onward, and is directed toward populations rather than individual bodies.

2015, Joe Painter, “Power”, in John Agnew, Virginie Mamadouh, Anna J. Secor, Joanne Sharp, editors, The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Political Geography, Chichester, England: John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 147:

(political science) The sum of the various techniques used by modern nation-states to control not individual subjects but their entire populations, as contrasted with traditional modes of power based on the threat of death from a sovereign.


babysitter test

The babysitter, presumably between the ages of ten and 15, is quite explicitly expected to function in a way usually expected of mature individuals.

1993, Gideon Koren et al., “Maturity of Children to Consent to Medical Research: The Babysitter Test,”, in Journal of Medical Ethics, volume 19, number 3, page 146:

To highlight the inadequacy of such evidence, we propose what we call “the babysitter test” for future prosecution witnesses in death penalty cases. We suggest that, to send someone to the gurney or the electric chair on the word of one witness, the prosecutor must agree to hire that witness as a babysitter for her or his kids for one evening.

2001, Michael L. Radelet, Hugo Bedau, “Erroneous Convictions and the Death Penalty,”, in Wrongly Convicted: Perspectives on Failed Justice, Saundra Westervelt and John A. Humphrey eds., →ISBN, page 274:

I use a babysitter test when it comes to Israel, Indyk said. Do I trust this man or woman with my child? Will he or she be in the trenches when it really counts? Obama would.

2008 October 25, Emily Baltz, “U.S. Ambassador Calls On Jewish Voters To Drop Republican Support, Back Obama”, in cbsnews.com, retrieved 2010-08-25:

(idiomatic, social sciences, law, public policy) An informal method for assessing the maturity, reliability, or probity of a person, inviting one to judge whether one would entrust this person with the care of one's own children.


QT

QT (countable and uncountable, plural QTs)

In contrast to structuralist frameworks which seek to filter the "essential" characteristics of a phenomenon from the messiness of lived experience, QT sees all identity as perpetually in contest and, consequently, variable […].

2016, Jason P. Murphy, Catherine A. Lugg, “Scavenging as Queer Methodology”, in Nelson M. Rodriguez, Wayne J. Martino, Jennifer C. Ingrey, Edward Brockenbrough, editors, Critical Concepts in Queer Studies and Education (Queer Studies and Education), Palgrave Macmillan, →ISBN, page 389:

(LGBTQ, social sciences) Initialism of queer theory.


necrocracy

necrocracy (countable and uncountable, plural necrocracies)

From necro- (“dead”) + -cracy (“power, rule”).

confix

What we call democracy, therefore, is to a considerable extent necrocracy, or a form of government by the graveyards. Old precepts and phrases are handed down from one generation to another; they become part of a nation's heritage […]

1928, William Bennett Munro, The Invisible Government: The Jacob H. Schiff Foundation Lectures Delivered at Cornell University, 1926, New York, N.Y.: Macmillan Co., →OCLC, page 2:

Other activities became increasingly pressing, the Fellowship was flourishing and had plenty of younger members ready and able to take over from their elders; and I have seen too many cases of vigorous organisations gradually turning into gerontocracies and finally into necrocracies to wish ever to hold on to power myself.

1992, E[ric] L[ionel] Mascall, “Extra-Curricular Activities (1937–1962)”, in Saraband: The Memoirs of E. L. Mascall, Leominster, Herefordshire: Gracewing, Fowler Wright Books, →ISBN, page 190:

Further, even if one hundred per cent of the governed in 1789 fully supported the Constitution, the constitutional rule by the dead—one might call it necrocracy—is not democracy. Democracy requires self-government, which cannot be the dead ruling the living. Though legislators now dead passed many statutes now in force, a mere majority in the current Congress can repeal statutes but cannot amend the Constitution.

1996, Sterling Harwood, Judicial Activism: A Restrained Defense, San Francisco, Calif.: Austin & Winfield, →ISBN, page 21:

Iran might still become a democracy, but it would also be a necrocracy: government of, by and for the dead.

2005, Robert Fisk, The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East, London: Fourth Estate, →ISBN:

(political science) A form of government imposed by those who have since died.


consent of the governed

(government, political science, philosophy) A political theory in which a government or set of governments could only be deemed legitimate if it is supported by the people under which it exercises its political influence.


heterophily

In their review of the impact of heterophily on group process outcomes, Milliken and Martins (1996) acknowledge that past research conflicts on whether heterophily inhibits or facilitates positive group outcomes.

2002, Mikayla Hughes, The Role of Competence, Perceived Heterophily, and Satisfaction in the Context of University-community Collaborative Relationships:

(social sciences) Tendency of individuals to collect in diverse groups.


foldback

en-noun

foldback (countable and uncountable, plural foldbacks)

(social sciences) A multimethod research approach that includes open-ended interviewing, nominal group dialogue, survey and attitude scaling techniques, and multidimensional and cluster analyses.


transitology

transitology (usually uncountable, plural transitologies)

(political science) The study of the process of change from one political regime to another.


sociosexuality

(social sciences) Personal predisposition to engage in sexual activity outside of a committed relationship.


subjecthood

Subjecthood emphasizes obedience. Citizenship, on the other hand, recognizes moral obligations to other members of the community and emphasizes responsiveness and participation.

1998, Christopher Vincenzi, “From Subjecthood to Citizenship”, in Crown Powers, Subjects and Citizens, →ISBN, page 301:

But that should not be confused or conflated with citizenship, for, according to Jebb, "citizenship includes subjecthood, but subjecthood does not include citizenship."

2010, Sukanya Banerjee, “Introduction”, in Becoming Imperial Citizens: Indians in the Late-Victorian Empire, →ISBN, page 25:

(political science) The condition or state of a person being a subject of a nation or a monarch.


counterdiscursive

en-adj

counterdiscursive (comparative more counterdiscursive, superlative most counterdiscursive)

more counterdiscursive (comparative)
most counterdiscursive (superlative)

All of their texts, which were written during the 1980s and 1990s, share an oppositional and counterdiscursive impulse through which they express the possibility of a community different from that offered by the dominant culture.

2001, Petra Fachinger, Rewriting Germany from the Margins, page 5:

Postcolonial analyses of cultural production study counterdiscursive practices in cultures affected by the imperial enterprise, such as the legacy of subjugation and resistance of the black populations of the Americas.

2003, Dorothy E. Mosby, Place, Language, and Identity in Afro-Costa Rican Literature, page 27:

Overcompensating for anti-fat rhetorics by emphasizing the relative health and beauty of fatness, is I guess, a rather inevitable step in fighting for the rights of oppressed groups by performing counterdiscursive fat perfection.

2008, Lesleigh J. Owen, Living large in a size medium world, page 134:

(social sciences) Opposing or countering a discourse, or institutionalized way of thinking.


antidiscursive

antidiscursive (comparative more antidiscursive, superlative most antidiscursive)

more antidiscursive (comparative)
most antidiscursive (superlative)

(social sciences) Opposing a discourse, or institutionalized way of thinking.

antidiscursivo

opposing an institutionalized way of thinking


antipositivism

(social sciences) The view that the social realm may not be subject to the same methods of investigation as the natural world.

antipositivismo

the view that the social realm may not be subject to the same methods of investigation as the natural world


antipositivistic

antipositivistic (comparative more antipositivistic, superlative most antipositivistic)

more antipositivistic (comparative)
most antipositivistic (superlative)

(social sciences) Relating to antipositivism.


antipositivist

antipositivist (comparative more antipositivist, superlative most antipositivist)

more antipositivist (comparative)
most antipositivist (superlative)


antipositivist

(social sciences) An advocate of antipositivism.


iron triangle

Over the years the defense industry has become a de facto participant in the policy-making process. As in other areas dominated by powerful corporate interests, a policy sub-government or “iron triangle” has emerged. […] The creation of an “iron triangle” takes time and active efforts of its participants. All three sides work to maintain it as economic circumstances change.

1981, Gordon Adams, The Iron Triangle: The Politics of Defense Contracting, New York: The Council on Economic Priorities, →ISBN, pages 24–25:

They see the raids as evidence that the “iron triangle” of bureaucrats, politicians and businessmen that in 50 years has turned Japan into the world's second-largest economy has broken down when there is nothing to replace it.

1996 December 7, Velisarios Kattoulas, International Herald Tribune, “Corruption Scandals Rack Tokyo's ‘Iron Triangle’”, in International Herald Tribune, →ISSN:

(US politics, political science) The policy-making relationship among the congressional committees, the bureaucracy (executive, sometimes called “government agencies”), and interest groups or lobbyists.


counterdiscourse

Counterdiscourses such as postcolonial and resistance literatures struggle with their hybrid nature. They generally find it necessary to appropriate the language and techniques of the center which they oppose.

1999, Greg Carey, Elusive Apocalypse: Reading Authority in the Revelation to John:

(social sciences) A way of thinking that opposes an institutionalized discourse.


postmaterialism

Someone's placing higher importance on nonmaterialist values such as autonomy and self-expression, as opposed to materialist values such as economic and physical wellbeing.

(political science) The theory that political preferences in contemporary affluent (mostly Western) societies are increasingly based on such values, especially with regard to the leftist spectrum, in such a way that parties move away from traditional Marxist materialism.


horseshoe theory

Referring to the curved shape of a horseshoe, whose two ends come close to meeting.

There is some evidence, contradictory as it is, that if the PDS [Party of Democratic Socialism] did not exist, then the consequence would be a strengthening of the DVU [German People's Union], the NPD [National Democratic Party of Germany] and the Republikaner […] This does not mean, however, that I subscribe to the ever-present but increasingly orthodox horseshoe theory of political analysis […]

2000, Peter Thompson, “The PDS: Marx's Baby or Stalin's Bathwater?”, in Peter Barker, editor, The GDR and its History: Rückblick und Revision (German Monitor; 49), Rodopi, →ISBN, page 103:

Some political scientists have suggested a “horseshoe theory,” with the center as the rounded top of a horseshoe and the two fringes on either end, but inclined toward one another. This image, while evocative, isn’t quite right. In the archive, it looks more like a circle.

2022 December 14, Kathleen Belew, “The Crunchy-to-Alt-Right Pipeline”, in The Atlantic:

(political science) The theory that the far left and the far right, rather than being at opposite ends of a political continuum, in fact closely resemble one another.


allosexual

From allo- (“other”) + sexual. "Directed at or involving another rather than one's self" and "involving the other sex; heterosexual" are the most etymologically literal senses (regarding the latter sense, compare the structure of heterosexual), structural and semantic opposites of autosexual and isosexual. The sense "non-heterosexual" was influenced by (and had influence on) Canadian French allosexuel.

Allosexual behavior peaked during the follicular phase for both heterosexual women and lesbians.

2002, Mary H Burleson et al., “Sexual behavior in lesbian and heterosexual women: relations with menstrual cycle phase and partner availability”, in Psychoneuroendocrinology, volume 27, number 4, pages 489–503:

Allosexual behavior was positively related to libido, and negatively related to positive and "premenstrual" emotional factors. Autosexual behavior was predicted by libido and an energetic / creative emotional factor.

2011 August, Susan G. Brown, Marites J. Calibuso, Amanda L. Roedl, “Women’s Sexuality, Well-Being, and the Menstrual Cycle: Methodological issues and their interrelationships”, in Archives of Sexual Behavior, volume 40, number 4, pages 755–765:

There are intense debates in the psychoanalytic literature as to whether the primary form of infantile desire is allosexual (directed toward the other — in this case, the mother, the source of nourishment, her breast, her milk) or auto-erotic.

2012, Lauren Berlant, Desire/Love, →ISBN, page 26:

(chiefly social sciences, of sexual desire or activity) Directed toward or involving another person rather than (only) oneself.


kratocracy

From Ancient Greek κρᾰ́τος (krắtos, “strength, might”) + -cracy.

uder

[…] as the cover for plutocracy is replaced by timocracy and by the one-man kratocracy which we call dictatorship.

1950, Wm. Pepperell Montague, Great Visions of Philosophy: Varieties of Speculative Thought in the West from the Greeks to Bergson, page 109:

To many outside observers, Turkey is a unique country that seems perpetually balancing on a steep precipice between kratocracy and democracy, between Islam and capitalism, or even more melodramatically, between East and West.

2012, Cory Blad, Banu Koçer, Political Islam and State Legitimacy in Turkey: The Role of National Culture in Neoliberal State-Building in International Political Sociology, volume 6, page 36

For, without its feeling of compassion, a kratocracy, […]

In Praise of a Roman-American Rhapsody in 2013 (originally 1997), Francis Boni, A Life Song Between Two Worlds: Revised and Expanded, iUniverse LLC, page 37

(political science) A government established by the forceful or cunning seizure of power and maintained by strength.


counterstorytelling

In the following sections, we offer a detailed discussion and example of the role of storytelling – and more specifically counterstorytelling – in understanding the campus racial culture at PWIs.

2012, Samuel D. Museus, Uma M. Jayakumar, Creating Campus Cultures:

(social sciences) The dissemination of a story or narrative that goes against the prevailing view.


imagology

en-noun

imagology (countable and uncountable, plural imagologies)

Applied to American Studies, imagology—the term derives from Latin “imago”/image—asks not how Americans themselves see America, but how other cultures view the United States. In other words, what is the image of the United States as seen in literatures from outside the United States?

2016, Reingard M. Nischik, “On Imagology, Canadian-US Relations, and Popular Culture: National Images and Border Crossings in Margaret Atwood’s Works”, in Comparative North American Studies, page 93:

(social sciences) The study of cultural stereotypes as presented in literature etc.


transformationalism

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-transformationalism.wav

While the supplanted transformationalism was not specifically Neo-Confucian, a central prop of the newly elevated emperorship affirmed a Han-dynasty contention that Zhu Xi had opposed.

2004, Gerald F Gaus, Chandran Kukathas, Handbook of Political Theory, →ISBN, page 330:

So long as late Qing transformationalism based on allegiance to Confucian values prevailed, the grounds nationalists were seeking for uniting those identified as "Chinese" against those identified as "Manchus", "Mongols," "Uigurs," "Tibetans," and even Chinese Muslims.

2005, Joshua A. Fogel, The Teleology of the Modern Nation-state: Japan and China, page 144:

As both Yu Yonghe and Huang Shujing recognized, racialist discourse was incongrous with the Confucian ideal of transformationalism, for the claim that barbarians possessed distinct inborn natures, or fixed moral characters, suggested that they were unassimilable.

2006, Emma Teng, Taiwan's Imagined Geography, →ISBN, page 115:

(political science, historical) The belief in the transformative power of Confucian culture as a superior system that can be universally applied to all people.

The difference is still significant, however, in circumstances where the possibility of widespread adherence to an extensive set of obligations is unlikely, for "transformationalism" would support the watering down of the regime in exchange for broader membership, in the belief that the operation of the regime will, over time, increase the convergence of interests.

2001, Mark J. Valencia, Maritime Regime Building, →ISBN, page 3:

The third perspective of globalisation, transformationalism, recognises the contingency of action and the historicity of structure as enabling and constraining globalisation.

2002, Reza Banakar, Max Travers, An introduction to law and social theory, page 313:

Martell (2010) focuses on hyper-globalization, scepticism, transformationalism and postmodernism/post structuralism and constructivism. We do not consider transformationalism, a hybrid approach between globalism and scepticism, in this chapter due to space limitations (although this approach has a growing following).

2011, Heather Savigny, Lee Marsden, Doing Political Science and International Relations, →ISBN, page 246:

Thus, whilst liberal transformationalism is right to ask questions about the poverty, inequality, and the democratic deficit generated by neoliberal globalisation, the answers it proposes cannot seriously resolve these issues because they are intrinsic to the capitalism question that liberal transformationalism does not ask.

2014, Tom Chodor, Neoliberal Hegemony and the Pink Tide in Latin America, →ISBN, page 29:

(political science) A political theory that emphasizes assimilation as a process of global cultural convergence.


rentier state

(political science) A state that derives all or much of its national revenue from the rent of indigenous resources to external clients.


interdiscursive

en-adj

interdiscursive (comparative more interdiscursive, superlative most interdiscursive)

more interdiscursive (comparative)
most interdiscursive (superlative)


chumship

en-noun

chumship (countable and uncountable, plural chumships)

(social sciences) preadolescent friendship between two people of the same sex


affective partisan polarization

affective partisan polarization (uncountable)

(political science, US) the process of steady growth of the mutual dislike between Republicans and Democrats since the 1970s


sociosymbolic

(social sciences) Relating to society and symbols.


metaconsumption

In metaconsumption, the objectification, rather than the object itself, is shared, circulated, and consumed. This objectification can impart status to and shape identity for those who are able to lay claim to it through language.

2008, Shalini Shankar, Desi Land: Teen Culture, Class, and Success in Silicon Valley:

(social sciences) The consumption of a process of consumption, rather than of an actual work or product.


LTV

LTV (countable and uncountable, plural LTVs)

labor theory of value
labor theory of value#English

(economics, political science) Initialism of labor theory of value.


coolitude

From coolie + -itude; coined by Mauritian poet Khal Torabully.

(social sciences) An international cultural identity of the Indian or Chinese "coolie" diaspora, and by extension also similar migrations.


crypto-anarchism

The rise of crypto-anarchism might be good news for individual users – and there are plenty working on ways of using this technology for decent social purposes – but it’s also bad news for governments.

2017 June 4, Jamie Bartlett, “Forget far-right populism – crypto-anarchists are the new masters”, in The Observer:

(computing, political science) The belief that cyberspace should exist decentralized and without authority, achievable through cryptography.

Krypto-Anarchismus

discipline concerned with communication security

(political science) The realization of anarchy in cyberspace.


countertext

Alice Randall's novel "The Wind Done Gone" is a countertext to Margaret Mitchell's novel "Gone with the Wind".

(literature, social sciences) A text that opposes another, often by presenting similar events from a different perspective.


Gandhism

Another critic observes Gandhism dreads the 'onslaught of technology' because it creates unemployment.

1945, Mohanlal Lallubhai Dantwala, Gandhism Reconsidered, page 28:

In trying to curb modern political Machiavellianism, some of the more consistent humanists find this analogy in the ethical ideas and the political practice of Gandhiism.

1972, Aleksandr Ivanovich Titarenko, Morality and politics;: Critical essays on contemporary views about the relationship between morality and politics in bourgeois sociology, page 142:

(political science, philosophy) The philosophy and principles of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, encompassing the broad tenets of upholding truth, pacifism, and nonviolent activism; also rarely used for Gandhian economics.


nomadology

nomadology (countable and uncountable, plural nomadologies)

(social sciences) The study of personal identities that are not rooted in one place or limited to a single fixed worldview.


Duverger's law

Attributed to Maurice Duverger, French sociologist who published on the subject in the 1950s and 1960s.

Out of that work emerged Duverger’s Law, which holds that single-member districts tend to produce two-party systems. […] And in the long run, the inexorable machinery of Duverger’s Law will ensure that the Patriot Party is folded back into the Republican Party.

2021 January 28, Michael Tomasky, “Why a Trump Third Party Would Be a Boon for Democrats”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

proportional representation
proportional representation

(political science) The principle that plurality-rule elections (such as first past the post) structured within single-member districts tend to favour a two-party system, and that the double-ballot majority system and proportional representation tend to favor multipartyism.


stasiology

Borrowed from French stasiologie, coined in 1951 by French jurist, sociologist and politician Maurice Duverger (1917–2014) from stase (“stasis”) + -iologie (“-ology, indicating the study of a particular subject”), because of the way the opposition of political parties tends to prevent governments from making dramatic changes.

The development of the science of political parties (it could perhaps be called stasiology).

1954 [1951], Maurice Duverger, translated by Barbara North and Robert North, Political Parties, their Organization and Activity in the Modern State, Methuen & Co.; New York, N.Y.: John Wiley & Sons, translation of Les partis politiques (in French), →OCLC:

In this study, in the light of latest trends in stasiology, an attempt is made to examine the potential role of political parties in initiating, directing and managing social, economic and political changes in Himachal Pradesh.

1977, Ranbir Sharma, Party Politics in a Himalayan State, New Delhi: National Publishing House, →OCLC, page v:

The surprising development in this regard is that, despite all these difficulties, students are engaged in making an empirical study of party politics with the aim of refining the discipline of stasiology.

1982, J[agdish] C[handra] Johari, “Party Politics”, in Comparative Politics, 3rd rev. and enl. edition, New Delhi: Sterling Publishers, →OCLC, page 318:

political parties
political party#English

(political science, rare) The study of political parties.


whitestream

en-verb

whitestream (third-person singular simple present whitestreams, present participle whitestreaming, simple past and past participle whitestreamed)

whitestreams (present singular third-person)
whitestreaming (participle present)
whitestreamed (participle past)
whitestreamed (past)

In addition to manipulating the curriculum, Native American children were whitestreamed by severely controlling their actions and very closely monitoring their behavior.

(transitive, social sciences) To bias toward white people and their history.


prescriptionist

en-adj

prescriptionist (comparative more prescriptionist, superlative most prescriptionist)

more prescriptionist (comparative)
most prescriptionist (superlative)

Much of the disagreement between the prescriptionist and descriptionist views turns on the question of compensation among generations.

1996, James P. Bruce, Hoe-sŏng Yi, Erik F. Haites, Climate Change 1995, →ISBN:

Educators often come into the profession with a certain view of language that is more prescriptionist in nature (Edwards, 1982; Taylor, 1983; Trudgill, 1975; Williams, 1976).

2008, Maria Elisa Paredes, Language Attitudes, Linguistic Knowledge, and the Multicultural Education of Pre-Service Teachers, →ISBN:

Teaching the English language may be their bread and butter, but they are unable to enforce the notion of a 'standard prescriptionist English.'

2014, Stuart Nicholson, Is Jazz Dead?: Or Has It Moved to a New Address, →ISBN, page 174:

(political science, linguistics) Relying on historical precedent rather than current usage (to determine rights or correctness).


longue durée

Borrowed from French longue durée (“long duration”). Attested since the 1960s.

lange linjer

historiographical term, "long lines of history"

The "Annales" school draws attention to the virtually unchanging geography of a region, the rising and ebbing movements of the economy, or the rhythmic repetitions in social relations — i.e., to the "longue duree" — rather than to those fleeting events we call political.

1978, Lynn Avery Hunt, Revolution and Urban Politics in Provincial France: Troyes and Reims, 1786-1790, Stanford University Press, →ISBN, page 1:

(historiography, social sciences) A long period of time during which social processes develop or social structures evolve.


toxic masculinity

Coined by psychologist Shepherd Bliss of the mythopoetic men's movement around 1986 and first attested in 1990 (see quote below). Compare hegemonic masculinity, which was coined in 1982.

For example, I speak of toxic masculinity as that which damages men, women, children and the earth through neglect, abuse and violence.

1990 January 18, Shepherd Bliss, “Letters (Gay Supportive)”, in Bay Area Reporter, volume XX, number 3, San Fransisco: Benro Enterprises, page 8:

In addition, many male feminists seek to rid themselves of what they regard as toxic masculinity promoted in men by socialization and to develop in themselves sensitivities and tenderness more typically socialized into women.

2005, Eli Sagan, Gendered Lives: Communication, Gender & and Culture, Wadsworth, →ISBN, page 302:

The facts of toxic masculinity are rarely discussed after mass shootings, as we beat the usual drums of gun control and mental health.

2016 June 27, Stephen T. Asma, “The weaponised loser”, in Aeon:

(social sciences, media criticism) The aspects of traditional masculinity perceived to reinforce aggression, emotionlessness and other negative qualities.


form of government

en-noun

form of government (plural forms of government)

(political science) The system by which a state or community is controlled, as for decision-making or choice of rulers.


intersectionalist

en-adj

intersectionalist (comparative more intersectionalist, superlative most intersectionalist)

more intersectionalist (comparative)
most intersectionalist (superlative)

Aside from these general challenges, I address issues of self-hate, shame, anger, and frustration by bringing in the intersectionalist perspective of domination.

2008, Lisa Guerrero, Teaching Race in the 21st Century, page 79:

(sociology, social sciences) Based on or informed by theories of intersectionality.


intersectionalist

What feminists, especially intersectionalists, have been imagining as identities needs to be exchanged for descriptions of social circumstances.

2005, Naomi Zack, Inclusive Feminism: A Third Wave Theory of Women's Commonality, page 75:

(sociology, social sciences) A proponent of intersectionality.


Eurowestern

(social sciences) Of or relating to the Western world and European culture.


pilot wave

Coined by Louis de Broglie from the idea that the waveform pilots (guides) particles.

Pilot waves and projections from the implicate order to the explicate order of sense-perceptible phenomena are inscrutable to our everyday consiousness, at least directly.

1998, Michael Knapik, Developing Intelligent Agents for Distributed Systems, →ISBN, page 18:

Speaking in general terms, my hypothesis is that the pilot wave of my consciousness directs my consciousness through configuration space in the sense of actualizing these possibilities; e.g. a possible hue becomes an actual content of my visual awareness by virtue of being actualized by a mental wave-form, in particular, an intentional act. More exactly, as we shall see below, it is the more complex wave-form produced by the entaglement of my brain's pilot wave with the pilot wave of my consciousness that simultaneously actualizes the sensory quale and a set of nerve cell firings.

2003, Quentin Smith, Aleksandar Jokic, Consciousness: New Philosophical Perspectives, →ISBN, page 430:

The quadratic function varies essentially more strongly than the linear function, and, as a result, such a financial pilot wave induces a nontrivial financial force.

2010, Andrei Y. Khrennikov, Ubiquitous Quantum Structure: From Psychology to Finance, →ISBN, page 163:

(social sciences, by extension) A wavefunction on some measurement of information that guides the consciousness or behavior of individual people.


deborder

en-verb

deborder (third-person singular simple present deborders, present participle debordering, simple past and past participle debordered)

deborders (present singular third-person)
debordering (participle present)
debordered (participle past)
debordered (past)

(transitive, social sciences) to remove the borders from

(transitive, social sciences) to free from the restrictions of a border


intergovernmentalism

From intergovernmental + -ism or inter- + governmentalism.

There is a slew of treaties, organizations and agencies that form the scaffolding of the emerging global governance structure regulating and superintending everything from nuclear weapons to the fishing of halibut, and all of them embody electionless intergovernmentalism.

2016 January 21, Leigh Phillips, “Electionless inter-governmentalism über alles”, in ROAR Magazine:

(political science) An approach to political integration that regards states, and national governments in particular, as the primary actors in the integration process.


deathmaking

(social sciences) The process of causing individuals to die, as by withdrawing health care, carrying out abortions, etc.


deimperialization

deimperialisation (alternative)
de-imperialization (alternative)

Perhaps the British should study Turkey; God knows, we need models for de-imperialisation.

1972, Angela Carter, “The Back of Beyond”, in Shaking a Leg, Vintage, published 2013, page 253:

The implosion of the USSR itself, beginning in 1991 after the loss of its east European dominions, in effect constituted an enormous deimperialization process of a system based on eight decades of ‘internal terror and fear of external enemies’.

2007, Bertil Nygren, The Rebuilding of Greater Russia:

(political science) The process of deimperializing; the dismantling or formal ending of an empire.


labour value theory

(economics, political science) Alternative form of labor theory of value.


labor theory of value

labour theory of value (alternative)
labor value theory (alternative)
labor-value theory (alternative)
labour value theory (alternative)
labour-value theory (alternative)

socially necessary human labor time
socially necessary labour time

(economics, political science) The theory, usually associated with Marxian economics, that freely reproducible goods obtain their value from socially necessary human labor time.


orienate

orienate (third-person singular simple present orienates, present participle orienating, simple past and past participle orienated)

orienates (present singular third-person)
orienating (participle present)
orienated (participle past)
orienated (past)

/ˈɔɹiɛnˌeɪt/

Probably from an incorrectly relatinized form of orientate, from Latin oriēns (“orient”, oriēnt- in compounds) + -ate (verb-forming suffix), or, from a misspelling of the same (see Citations page). Compare oriency and orience as well as eventerate.

af

We may also discern that Mary picks up something of a possible rebuke as, in her final turn, she orienate directly to this contrast between *then' and ' now' by identifying Jean and Mary as "you' - [...]

2005, David Middleton, Steve D Brown, The Social Psychology of Experience:

"...a militant party, a revolutionary party, bold enongh to lead the proletarians to the struggle for power, with sufficient experience to be able to orienate itself in the complicated problems that arise in a revolutionary situation [...]

And one must also be able to orienate himself quickly, to catch up the direction of the approaching fashions.

From March 11 to March 18 the condition grew progressively worse; the patient became restless; he developed stertorous breathing, became stuporous, and failed to recognize his wife, but on March 20 became orienated, complaining of numbness in the side of the face; [...]

1930, United States Veterans' Bureau Medical report, volume VI:

(transitive, reflexive or intransitive, social sciences, religion, dated) To change (or make something change) for or get accustomed (or make something get accustomed) to a new situation, adapt.


microinteraction

microinteractions (plural)
micro-interaction (alternative)

If our brisk urban life is no longer broken up by chats at the cash register or banter with the barman[…], if we lose the benefits of all those micro-interactions that we know make us feel more connected, is it not inevitable that isolation and disconnection will be greater?

2020, Noreena Hertz, The Lonely Century, Hodder & Stoughton, →ISBN:

(social sciences) A short social interaction.


polyscopic

en-adj

polyscopic (comparative more polyscopic, superlative most polyscopic)

more polyscopic (comparative)
most polyscopic (superlative)

(social sciences) Involving various methods and perspectives.


queerity

en-noun

queerity (countable and uncountable, plural queerities)

(social sciences) Queerness, in the sense of not conforming to sexual or gender norms.


biocolonization

The term "biocolonization" is used to describe the combined control of genetic and agricultural resources by a few multinational firms, which holds a powerful weapon for the invasion of cultures. Biocolonization is regarded as a real threat facing large sectors worldwide, particularly when it affects human food.

2016, Salah E. O. Mahgoub, Genetically Modified Foods: Basics, Applications, and Controversy, CRC Press, →ISBN, page 276:

(social sciences) Colonization (and taking control) of populations or states by taking control of their agricultural resources and making them reliant on the colonizer's (bio)medical or agricultural (especially genetically-modified) supplies.


endocolonization

All of these practices by which the body is voluntarily tortured, disciplined, denied and de(p)leted are part of a larger tendency Paul Virilio calls "endocolonization": "It's no longer exo-colonization (the age of extending world conquest) but the age of intensiveness and endocolonization. One now colonizes only one's own population […]" In the age of endocolonization, then, bodies are disappearng from themselves and (dis)integrating into technology.

1990, Cincinnati Romance Review, pages 62–63:

Does that dominance produce its own endocolonizations? Is there thus a dominant culture, then, or is all culture and subculture — from the American middle class to cadres of Queer theorists — dominant and dominating to those who live within it?

2002, Anthony Kubiak, Agitated States: Performance in the American Theater of Cruelty, University of Michigan Press, →ISBN, page 31:

But Maslowska's text obeys a different, post-cold war imperative: to mirror a cultural and socioeconomic situation that is precisely not that of the colonial epoch during which Poland was the site of various European endocolonizations, devoured amongst Russian (later Soviet) and Austo-Hungarian empires.

Western national economies were beginning to turn inward, and endocolonization was launched at home. At that point, Western high art could indeed identify its subjects with colonial peoples, as the Westerners were now being subjected […]

2009, Enda Duffy, The speed handbook: velocity, pleasure, modernism, Duke University Press Books, page 45:

As stated above, no longer is this a situation of partial endocolonization, but instead one of total endocolonization, a situation also referred to by Virilio as total war.

2013, J. Adams, Occupy Time: Technoculture, Immediacy, and Resistance after Occupy Wall Street, Springer, →ISBN:

(social sciences) Colonization by a state or society of (part of) its own population, especially by taking control of their bodies or bodily integrity.


stylized fact

(social sciences, especially economics) A simplified presentation of an empirical finding.


labour theory of value

(economics, political science) UK standard spelling of labor theory of value.


labor-value theory

labor value theory
labor value theory#English

(economics, political science) Alternative form of labor value theory.


labour-value theory

labor-value theory
labor-value theory#English

(economics, political science) UK standard spelling of labor-value theory.


subalternism

(social sciences, literary theory) The condition of being a subaltern.


Andersonian

(political science) Of or pertaining to Benedict Anderson (1936–2015), Chinese-born Irish political scientist and historian.


class consciousness

class consciousness (plural class consciousnesses)

(Marxism, social sciences) An individual's awareness of their relative place within the class system of society.


cistem

It is this toilet cistem that served to cement the spatially constructed division between man and woman that is still present today.

2017, Nigel Patel, “Violent cistems: Trans experiences of bathroom space”, in Agenda: Empowering Women for Gender Equity, volume 31, number 1, page 52:

I can think of no better role model for a transgender individual, particularly one looking to tackle the "cistem" of health care.

2019, Kyan Lynch, “The Trans Man and the Warrior Women”, in Transgender Health, volume 4, number 1, page 278:

Capital High’s school culture is seemingly accepting to the LGBTQIA+ population, yet it is also one saturated by a white heteropatriarchal cistem, and continued education and activism are required to combat this.

2022, Kenan Omercajic, “'Basement Boys' in the All-Gender Bathroom: Investigating Student-Inspired Trans-Activism and White Cisgenderist Barriers to Supporting Trans Students in School”, in Teacher College Record, volume 124, number 8, page 229:

(LGBTQ, social sciences, neologism) A system or societal structure that privileges cisgender people and marginalizes transgender people.


participant observation

(social sciences) A research methodology used in some social sciences to gain familiarity with a group of individuals and their practices through an intensive involvement, usually over an extended period of time.


participant observer

participant observer (plural participant observers)

participant observers (plural)
participant-observer (alternative)

Between 1988 and 1992, I acted as a participant observer at over two hundred discos, clubs and raves and attended at least thirty live gigs for comparative purposes.

1995, Sarah Thornton, Club Cultures: Music, Media and Subcultural Capital, Wiley, →ISBN, page 106:

participant observation
participant observation

(social sciences) One doing participant observation.


positive statement

positive statement (plural positive statements)

(philosophy, social sciences) A statement concerning what is, was, or will be, based on empirical evidence.


mesoanalysis

mesoanalysis (countable and uncountable, plural mesoanalyses)

(social sciences) the analysis of institutions, organisations, and governmental social activity e.g. NGOs.


action theory

rational choice theory
rational choice theory

(political science, sociology) Any theory that centres its gaze, analysis, and interpretation around human action. E.g. rational choice theory, phenomenology, etc.


rational choice theory

(social sciences, economics, political science, sociology) A theory that argues individual decisions are based on that individual's understanding of the costs and benefits of a given action, shaped throughout the assumptions of self-interest and rational actors.