apologist

[uh-pol-uh-jist]

noun

1. a person who makes a defense in speech or writing of a belief, idea, etc.

2. Ecclesiastical.

   1. Also apologete a person skilled in apologetics.

   2. one of the authors of the early Christian apologies in defense of the faith.

apologist

/ əˈpɒlədʒɪst /

noun

1. a person who offers a defence by argument

Word History and Origins

Origin of apologist¹

First recorded in 1630–40; either from apolog(y) ( def. ) + -ist ( def. ) or from French apologiste

Example Sentences

Well into the 20th century, writes Mr. Easterly, apologists for apartheid pointed out that “Black South Africans were on average materially better off than most other Africans were.”

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It is spreading wider and faster than we thought, and it has even found an apologist in Kevin Roberts, president of the venerable Heritage Foundation.

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Her conclusion was startling, her tone defiant: “Put me wherever you want: misguided socialist, toothless humanist, naïve novelist, useful idiot, apologist, denier, ally, contrarian, collaborator, traitor, inexcusable coward.”

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But these bull-market apologists are laboring under a fundamental misunderstanding of bubbles: They don’t trace to weak earnings per se, but to how far ahead of those earnings the market rises.

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Don’t you know what time it is, as your apologists like to say, Mr. President?

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