the longest official word and its meaning?

Answer 1

"Official" longest word

The Guinness Book of Records, in its 1992 and subsequent editions, declared the "longest real word" in the English language to be floccinaucinihilipilification at 29 letters. Defined as "the act of estimating (something) as worthless", its usage has been recorded as far back as 1741. In recent times its usage has been recorded in the proceedings of the United States Senate by Senator Jesse Helms, and at the White House by Bill Clinton's press secretary Mike McCurry, albeit sarcastically. It is the longest non-technical word in the first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary. The acceptability of the 33-letter adverbial form flocci­nauci­nihili­pilificastically is subject to controversy.

The longest word in the Oxford English Dictionary is Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis, a word meaning, "a lung disease caused by inhaling toxic volcanic ash.". [1] However, the Oxford English Dictionary describes it as "a factitious word ... occurring chiefly as an instance of a very long word" and the Encyclopedia Britannica does not have an entry for it.

Answer 2

That really depends. If by official, you mean "appears in a dictionary..."

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis (-koniosis), a factitious word alleged to mean 'a lung disease caused by the inhalation of very fine silica dust' but occurring chiefly as an instance of a very long word.

That's a word that was made up by those wanting to create the world's longest word, and it appears in many dictionaries as such.

There are also chemical names that meet and break 75 letters.

HEPATICOCHOLANGIOCHOLECYSTENTEROSTOMIES (39 letters; surgical creation of a connection between the gall bladder and a hepatic duct and between the intestine and the gall bladder) is the longest word in Gould's Medical Dictionary.

If you're looking for the longest word outside of the English Language, try the Germans:

DONAUDAMPFSCHIFFAHRTSELEKTRIZITAETENHAUPTBETRIEBSWERKBAUUNTERBEAMTENGESELLSCHAFT (80 letters), "the club for subordinate officials of the head office management of the Danube steamboat electrical services (name of a pre-war club in Vienna)," according to 1996 Guinness.

Of course, out of all of these, Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious and Antidisestablishmentarianism are probably the easiest ones to say. XP

Answer 3

It might be supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (which appears in the Oxford English Dictionary), unless you want to count names of diseases (such as 'pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis', defined by the OED as "a factitious word alleged to mean 'a lung disease caused by the inhalation of very fine silica dust' but occurring chiefly as an instance of a very long word"), places (such as 'Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch', a village in Wales), chemical compounds (apparently there is one that is 1,913 letters long), and also a few words found only in Joyce's Finnegans Wake.

The word supercalifragilisticexpialidocious has obscure origins, pertaining as to when it was first used, but the roots are fairly clear, as Richard Lederer wrote in his book Crazy English: super- "above," cali- "beauty," fragilistic- "delicate," expiali- "to atone," and docious- "educable," the sum meaning roughly "Atoning for extreme and delicate beauty while still being highly educable."

Or perhaps smiles is the longest word — after all, there is a mile between the first letter and the last.

Answer 4

pNEUMONOULTRAMICROSCOPICSILICOVOLCANOCONIOSIS (45 letters; a lung disease caused by breathing in certain particles) is the longest word in any English-language dictionary. (It is also spelled -koniosis.)
On Feb. 23, 1935, the New York Herald-Tribune reported on page 3:

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis succeeded electrophotomicrographically as the longest word in the English language recognized by the National Puzzlers' League at the opening session of the organization's 103d semi-annual meeting held yesterday at the Hotel New Yorker.
The puzzlers explained that the forty-five-letter word is the name of a special form of silicosis caused by ultra-microscopic particles of siliceous volcanic dust.
pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis (-koniosis), a factitious word alleged to mean 'a lung disease caused by the inhalation of very fine silica dust' but occurring chiefly as an instance of a very long word........Why?

Answer 5

Antidisestablishmentarianism: opposition to the disetablishment of an established (state) church, especially the Protestant Church of Ireland which was disestablished in 1874. There was also antidisestablishmentarianism when the Church of Wales was disestablished in the 1920s. Both are in communion with the Church of England, but are not official state churches anymore.

Answer 6

Antidisestablishmentarism???????
may have the spelling wrong but it refers to a movement of people who act against the people who are against the people who are against the government, or something

sassy girl that's a Latin word!!!! If we want a really long word lets check the Hawaiian language

Answer 7

Gillygilly hossenpheffer catsanellanbougun bythesea its all one word but this word program cuts it off if i don't put in spaces its a city in one of the Scandanavian countries I think

Answer 8

Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia this word is used to describe people who have a fear of a long words. yahoo wont write the last bit which is phobia

Answer 9

I think your first poster has figured it out, but check these out if you want a few more:

http://www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq/aboutwords/longestword

Answer 10

antidisestablishmentarianism-- it means to be anti-dishestablishmentarianism, or to be pro-establishmentarianism.