essentialism

noun

es·​sen·​tial·​ism i-ˈsen(t)-shə-ˌli-zəm 

1

: an educational theory that ideas and skills basic to a culture should be taught to all alike by time-tested methods compare progressivism

2

: a philosophical theory ascribing ultimate reality to essence embodied in a thing perceptible to the senses compare nominalism

3

: the practice of regarding something (such as a presumed human trait) as having innate existence or universal validity rather than as being a social, ideological, or intellectual construct

essentialist

i-ˈsen(t)-shə-list 

adjective or noun

Examples of essentialism in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Mussolini’s Motherhood Factories Matthew Wills April 1, 2022 In fascist Italy, childbirth, breastfeeding and motherhood were given a hybrid structure of industrial management and eugenicist biological essentialism. —The Editors, JSTOR Daily, 3 Mar. 2025

When used to explain differences between populations, genetic essentialism discounts the role that structural biases – inequities deeply ingrained in how systems operate – play in individual differences. —Shoumita Dasgupta, The Conversation, 13 Jan. 2025

Applying pressure to soft, secret places, the critic exposed fake oppositions, crude essentialisms, bourgeois hegemonies, totalizing mechanisms, humanist teleologies, squalid repressions, influential aporias, and many more textual fragilities. —Emily Eakin, New York Times, 18 Feb. 2025

People don't want to sit through these struggle sessions with this race essentialism. —NBC News, 2 Feb. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1927, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for essentialism

• activism
• ageism
• albinism
• altruism
• aneurism
• animism
• aphorism
• atomism
• barbarism
• bolshevism
• botulism
• brahmanism