Activism

How to spell activism

8 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce activism

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does activism mean?

1. nounThe practice of taking vigorous action, often through campaigning or protest, to bring about political or social change.

Activism in a sentence

• Years of grassroots activism finally pushed the council to fund the new shelter.

• Her online activism raised awareness about unsafe working conditions.

Where does activism come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word is a relatively modern coinage that joins the older adjective 'active' with the productive suffix '-ism'. The 'active' part traces back to the Latin activus, meaning 'practical' or 'busy with doing', which was built on the verb agere, 'to do, to drive, to set in motion'. That same agere root drives a whole family of English words, including 'agent', 'agile', and 'act' itself. The suffix '-ism', borrowed ultimately from the Greek ending -ismos, attaches to a stem to name a practice, doctrine, or movement, as in 'criticism' or 'socialism'. The combined form 'activism' appears in English only in the early twentieth century, originally in philosophical writing about action before settling into its modern political sense of vigorous campaigning for a cause. Because the word is built so transparently from familiar pieces, the spelling is regular: 'active' simply drops its final 'e' before the '-ism' ending.

How the word is built

• act (from Latin agere: to do, drive)
• -ive (adjective suffix)
• -ism (noun suffix for a practice or doctrine)