Germanism

American  

[jur-muh-niz-uhm] / ˈdʒɜr məˌnɪz əm /

noun

1. a usage, idiom, or other feature that is characteristic of the German language.

2. a custom, manner, mode of thought, action, etc., that is characteristic of the German people.

3. extreme partiality for or attachment to Germany, Germans, or German customs, manners, etc.

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Germanism British  

/ ˈdʒɜːməˌnɪzəm /

noun

1. a word or idiom borrowed from or modelled on German

2. a German custom, trait, practice, etc

3. attachment to or high regard for German customs, institutions, etc

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Other Word Forms

• anti-Germanism noun
• pro-Germanism noun

Etymology

Origin of Germanism

First recorded in 1605–15; German + -ism

Example Sentences

The story is most memorable in the passages where Germanism is horribly mocked by events, as Plievier evokes those last, insane days when thoroughness turned into madness, tables of organization into the outlines of farce.

From Time Magazine Archive

In a series of Advent sermons that packed St. Michael's Church he condemned the false choice that the Nazis had tried to place before Catholics�the choice between "Germanism" and disloyalty.

From Time Magazine Archive

But it is undeniable that Germanism, like Judaism, has evolved a doctrine of special election.

From Chosen Peoples Being the First "Arthur Davis Memorial Lecture" delivered before the Jewish Historical Society at University College on Easter-Passover Sunday, 1918/5678 by Zangwill, Israel

The result is that much of the Germanism of that age, sometimes far off from the great towns, still survives.

From Human, All-Too-Human, Part II by Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm

Miss von Schwertfeger said not a word, but with aquiline nose in the air held aloft the banner of Germanism.

From The Song of Songs by Sudermann, Hermann