aryanism
|ar-yan-ism|
🇺🇸
/ˈɛəriənɪzəm/
🇬🇧
/ˈeəriənɪz(ə)m/
belief in Aryan racial superiority
Etymology
'aryanism' originates from the English noun 'Aryan' plus the suffix '-ism' (forming a doctrine or system). The word 'Aryan' in English ultimately comes from Sanskrit ā́rya and Avestan airya, where that root meant 'noble' or 'honorable'.
The English term 'Aryan' was adopted in 18th–19th century comparative linguistics to label a group of Indo-European languages/peoples; in the late 19th and early 20th centuries the term was racialized in European writings and political movements, and 'aryanism' emerged to name the associated racial doctrines, later becoming strongly identified with Nazi ideology.
Initially, the root meant 'noble' or a self-designation among some Indo-Iranian peoples; over time the term was broadened and then racialized in European scholarship to suggest a biological 'Aryan' race, and 'aryanism' came to mean the political and racial ideology asserting Aryan superiority.
Meanings by Part of Speech
Noun 1
a racist ideology asserting the supposed biological superiority of the so-called 'Aryan' race; associated with white supremacism and central to Nazi racial policies.
Aryanism was a core element of Nazi ideology and underpinned policies of persecution and genocide.
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Noun 2
a historical/academic use (now largely outdated): theories in 19th- and early 20th-century scholarship that used the term 'Aryan' to refer to certain Indo-European or Indo-Iranian peoples; often intertwined with racial interpretations that have since been discredited.
Older linguistic and anthropological texts sometimes treated aryanism as a hypothesis about the spread of Indo-European peoples.
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Last updated: 2025/10/13 14:02