totalism
noun
Simple meaning
A social, economic and/or political system in which some authority wields absolute power.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
tohtuhlihzuhmSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈtoʊtəlɪzəm
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
rareusually uncountable
A social, economic and/or political system in which some authority (e.g. the state or "the market") wields absolute power; totalitarianism.
The principle of complete and unrestricted power in government
rarecountable
A philosophy, ideology or belief system that is total in its scope, one that covers everything.
rareuncountable
Totality; (the) entirety (of something).
rareuncountable
Totalness, absoluteness; the characteristic of being absolute in nature or scope.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The principle of complete and unrestricted power in government
Used this way, totalism is a specialist word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in government or politics and ethics or values contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Clinical and technical
- Usage feel
- Technical and specialized
Where it naturally appears
- Government/politics
- Ethics/values
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.