Nazi

[naht-see, nat-]

noun

plural

Nazis 

1. a member of the National Socialist German Workers' Party, which controlled Germany from 1933 to 1945 under Adolf Hitler and advocated totalitarian government, territorial expansion, antisemitism, and Aryan supremacy, all these leading directly to World War II and the Holocaust.

2. (often lowercase),  a person elsewhere who holds similar views.

3. (often lowercase),  a person who is fanatically dedicated to or seeks to regulate a specified activity, practice, etc..

   a jazz nazi who disdains other forms of music;

   health nazis trying to ban junk food.

adjective

1. of or relating to the Nazis.

Nazi

/ ˈnɑːtsɪ, ˈnɑːtsɪˌɪzəm, ˈnɑːtˌsɪzəm /

noun

1. a member of the fascist National Socialist German Workers' Party, which was founded in 1919 and seized political control in Germany in 1933 under Adolf Hitler

2. derogatory,  anyone who thinks or acts like a Nazi, esp showing racism, brutality, etc

adjective

1. of, characteristic of, or relating to the Nazis

Sensitive Note

Nazi in the extended sense of “a fanatical or domineering person” has existed at least since 1980 and parallels the use of the word police in the language police/the grammar police . Though this usage of Nazi is usually intended as jocular, it implies being intolerant of other people’s views and practices. And many people consider any extended use of the word Nazi to be offensive, in that it trivializes the terrible crimes of the German Nazis.

Other Word Forms

• anti-Nazi adjective
• pro-Nazi adjective
• Nazism noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of Nazi¹

First recorded in 1930–35; from German Nazi, short for Nationalsozialist “National Socialist”

Word History and Origins

Origin of Nazi¹

C20: from German, phonetic spelling of the first two syllables of Nationalsozialist National Socialist

Example Sentences

She was born in Prague in 1930 and at the age of nine was told she had to move to England on her own following the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia.

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Musk has also made headlines by supporting European far-right movements, criticising diversity policies, and making a gesture many observers interpreted as a Nazi salute.

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Australia banned the Nazi salute and the display or trade of Nazi symbols last year.

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Those aspirations were made more urgent in the early 1940s by revelations of the Nazi death camps.

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Its government made the Nazi salute punishable by a mandatory prison term earlier this year.

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