Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Educated people considered as a group; the literati.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The clergy, as distinguished from the laity.
- noun A body of clerks or learned men; the literati.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The literati, or well educated class.
- noun The clergy, or their opinions, as opposed to the laity.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun An
elite group ofintellectuals ; learned people, theliterati . - noun The
clergy , or their opinions, as opposed to thelaity .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun an educated and intellectual elite
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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But there is a certain ridicule, among superficial people, thrown on the scholars or clerisy, which is of no import unless the scholar heed it.
Representative Men 2006
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But there is a certain ridicule, among superficial people, thrown on the scholars or clerisy, which is of no import, unless the scholar heed it.
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But there is a certain ridicule, among superficial people, thrown on the scholars or clerisy, which is of no import, unless the scholars heed it.
Representative Men Ralph Waldo Emerson 1842
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I believe "clerisy" was first mentioned by Coleridge who wrote about the intellectual elite would be responsible to distribute culture throughout the (English) nation.
The Bourgeoisie and the Clerisy, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty 2009
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In The Bourgeois Virtues, Deirdre McCloskey refers to the merchant class as the bourgeoisie and the academic class as the clerisy.
The Bourgeoisie and the Clerisy, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty 2009
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These propoents of the clerisy believed themselves a cultural remname countering the two dominant philsophies of the era: Utilitarianiam and Evangelicism which both for their own reason downplayed art and culture.
The Bourgeoisie and the Clerisy, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty 2009
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But believing instead that meaningful change can come only from the “clerisy,” or educated elite, he has spent most of the past few decades trying to talk sense into British universities, and their English departments in particular.
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Mencius Moldbug likes to call the university system — and the mainstream media, which is full of journalists trained within the system — the Cathedral, because it controls public opinion as effectively as the medieval clerisy.
Big Paycheck or Service? Students Are Put to Test « Isegoria 2008
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But believing instead that meaningful change can come only from the “clerisy,” or educated elite, he has spent most of the past few decades trying to talk sense into British universities, and their English departments in particular.
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Obama lives on planet Obama, an almost Twilight Zone incarnation brought to you by an enthralled media class, a clerisy, a certain zeitgeist in the wake of the left's long march, ...
On Thursday, the Legg report will be published along with... 2009
figerrific commented on the word clerisy
KLER-uh-see\, noun:
The well educated class; the intelligentsia.
March 23, 2007
alexz commented on the word clerisy
'Amazingly, the rise of this micro-managing technocratic priesthood was predicted some 40 years ago by historian Daniel Bell. This academic-bureaucratic class even has a name: American sociologist Joel Kotkin calls it a "Clerisy". The Clerisy benefits, Kotkin explains, by increasing its role in directing investment - often to pet projects and causes.'
December 13, 2013
qms commented on the word clerisy
It’s easy to thrive as a pharisee
But better to boast a small heresy.
Society talks
Of the unorthodox
And welcomes them into the clerisy.
March 8, 2019
Schoenberg13 commented on the word clerisy
I was not familiar with the word clerisy until it popped up here as “Word of the Day” and I’m afraid I’ll never be able to use it without laughing: all I can see is clergy + heresy.
March 8, 2019