autodidact

American  

[aw-toh-dahy-dakt, -dahy-dakt] / ˌɔ toʊˈdaɪ dækt, -daɪˈdækt /

noun

1. a person who has learned a subject without the benefit of a teacher or formal education; a self-taught person.

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autodidact British  

/ ˈɔːtəʊˌdaɪdækt /

noun

1. a person who is self-taught

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Other Word Forms

• autodidactic
  adjective

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Etymology

Origin of autodidact

First recorded in 1525–35; from Greek autodídaktos “self-taught”; see origin at auto- ¹, didactic

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Explanation

An autodidact is someone who has learned things on their own, outside of school. If you've learned Greek and Latin, as well as landscape painting and auto repair, without any formal training, you are quite the autodidact. Auto- means "self," and didact comes from the Greek word for "teach," so an autodidact is a person who's self-taught. Being the autodidact that you are, instead of calling the plumber when your pipes burst, you bought some manuals and began to learn how to fix it yourself. You might want to learn scuba diving next, now that your apartment is flooded.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

autodidact

Its intellectual leader was Eliezer Yudkowsky, a Bay Area autodidact who dropped out of middle school.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 27, 2026

He was mid-century America’s foremost tough-hooligan intellectual, a high school dropout and autodidact who wrote and published four books while waiting to die.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 28, 2024

But laws are slow to leave the books, and the Music & Amusement Association needed someone like Sharpe — an autodidact with no financial ties to the industry — to hasten the process.

From Washington Post ● Mar. 26, 2023

He was an autodidact who read more than most college professors.

From Salon ● Nov. 23, 2022

Michele is essentially an autodidact, and so not to be taken too seriously.

From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton

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