Antidisestablishmentarianism
Published by Rick on Tuesday, December 02, 2008.
Antidisestablishmentarianism originated in the context of the nineteenth century Church of England, where antidisestablishmentarians were opposed to proposals to remove the Church of England’s status as the officially recognised and endorsed Christian church in England.
Being the officially recognised and endorsed Christian church means the Church of England is the established church.
To disestablish the Church of England is to remove the official recognition and endorsement.
Disestablishment is the process of removing the official recognition and endorsement from the Church of England.
Disestablishmentarians are the people who wish to disestablish the Church of England.
Antidisestablishmentarians are the people opposed to the disestablishment of the Church of England.
Antidisestablishmentarianism is the belief of the people opposed to the disestablishment of the Church of England.
Antidisestablishmentarianism is the normally accepted longest, non-scientific word in the English language. However, critics challenge its validity as a real word on the basis that it has two prefixes (anti- and dis-) and three suffixes (-ment, -arian and -ism), stating that not only is it possible to create a number of longer meaningful words by adding ever more prefixes, or changing the existing ones (e.g. changing -ism into the equally valid and longer suffix -istic), but that antidisestablishmentarianism is not a stand-alone word because of them. For example, theoretically counterantidisestablishmentarianism is a valid word, where it refers specifically to antidisestablishmentarians’ opponents, rather than merely disestablishmentarians in general.
Being the officially recognised and endorsed Christian church means the Church of England is the established church.
To disestablish the Church of England is to remove the official recognition and endorsement.
Disestablishment is the process of removing the official recognition and endorsement from the Church of England.
Disestablishmentarians are the people who wish to disestablish the Church of England.
Antidisestablishmentarians are the people opposed to the disestablishment of the Church of England.
Antidisestablishmentarianism is the belief of the people opposed to the disestablishment of the Church of England.
Antidisestablishmentarianism is the normally accepted longest, non-scientific word in the English language. However, critics challenge its validity as a real word on the basis that it has two prefixes (anti- and dis-) and three suffixes (-ment, -arian and -ism), stating that not only is it possible to create a number of longer meaningful words by adding ever more prefixes, or changing the existing ones (e.g. changing -ism into the equally valid and longer suffix -istic), but that antidisestablishmentarianism is not a stand-alone word because of them. For example, theoretically counterantidisestablishmentarianism is a valid word, where it refers specifically to antidisestablishmentarians’ opponents, rather than merely disestablishmentarians in general.
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