Why isn't antidisestablishmentarianism in the dictionary?

Answer 1

antidisestablishmentarianism, noun (an-tee-dis-eh-stab-lish-men-TAIR-ee-uh-niz-em)

Opposition to separation of the church and state.

[From Latin anti- (against) + dis- (apart, away) + English establish, from Latin stabilire, from stare (to stand) + -arian (one who supports) + Greek -ism (practice or state).]

At 28 letters, it's the best-known example of a long word. Here's how you can parse the word: one of the meanings of the word establishment is making a church an institution of the state. In the late 19th century England, there was a movement for the separation of the church and state: disestablishment. Those opposed to the idea of separation were antidisestablishmentarians. You can see where it's going. Why not a contraantidisestablishmentarianism?

-Anu Garg (garg AT wordsmith.org)

"As we said yesterday, the case for antidisestablishmentarianism has never been more threadbare. And if the case for the sovereign as head of a meaningful faith has gone, then the case for the sovereign has changed too." Royal Wedding: Crowning Nonsense; The Guardian (London, UK); Apr 9, 2005.

Answer 2

Antidisestablishmentariansim is not a widely used word, fairly antiquated. Other long words that you probably wouldn't find in the dictionary such as fluccinocinihilipilification also tend not to be used very often, and are being replaced by new synthetic words such as e-mail, and mega-byte.
If your interest is long words in books, try this; pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis - it might be in something like gray's anatomy.


ps. can't believe it won't let me enter that word, looks like there's a character count of only 30 letters. No bloody space for intellectuals, lol.

Answer 3

Dictionaries are descriptive, not prescriptive. If a long word isn't used very much outside of being cited as an example of a long word, it's not likely to get into many dictionaries.

Answer 4

It's "the man", "the establishment", "big brother". They have control over our minds! They are destroying knowledge in an attempt to control the masses! That's why they keep changing the dictionary. They destroyed public school until people resorted to "home schooling" then they take words out of the books!
Either that or it was a dare by those Guinness Book of World Records people!

Answer 5

1. It depends on what dictionary you look in
2. The English language is a progressive language and therefor words that are no longer in 'common' use are removed from the lexicon and from dictionaries, and replaced with new words that are in common use.

Answer 6

Who knows, why the hell is bootylicious and bling in the dictionary?!

Answer 7

Look up different ones pls

Answer 8

if its a scientific word, i don't think they put long scientific words in the dictionary

Answer 9

Your search was not too extensive...try wordsmith below.

Answer 10

It's in mine. Did you even look it up?