patriarchal

[ pey-tree-ahr-kuhl ]

adjective

1. of or relating to a patriarch, the male head of a family, tribe, community, church, order, etc.:

   my father's conservative, patriarchal ways.

2. characteristic of an entity, family, church, etc., controlled by men:

   a patriarchal church in which women are not allowed to hold leadership roles.

Other Words From

• patri·archal·ly patri·archi·cal·ly adverb
• anti·patri·archal adjective
• anti·patri·archal·ly adverb
• quasi-patri·archal adjective
• unpa·tri·archal adjective
• unpa·tri·archal·ly adverb

Word History and Origins

Origin of patriarchal¹

First recorded in 1425–75; from Late Latin patriarchālis, equivalent to patriarch(a) patriarch ( def ) + Latin -ālis -al ¹( def )

Example Sentences

Instead, we can take inspiration from women like Elizabeth, a woman who—like so many others before her and long since—was declared insane by a patriarchal society simply for speaking her mind.

From Time

Sure, the Heidi Klums and Alessandra Ambrosios all walked with figures that represented a type of patriarchal oppression, but that was hardly their fault.

From The Daily Beast

You come face to face with the machinery of patriarchal justice, because your word, as a female victim, is doubted at every turn.

From Time

As princesses, they typically have to learn to assert their agency within a restrictive, patriarchal society.

From Vox

In the gross-out gags of Bridesmaids and Broad City as well as the strip-club revisionism of Hustlers and P-Valley, female creators have challenged the idea that raunchy humor and sexually explicit content must cater to patriarchal tastes.

From Time

And yes, that authoritarian, patriarchal guru-power structure, invariably, always leads to abuses.

From The Daily Beast

In a patriarchal society—our society—a naked woman is a dangerous thing.

From The Daily Beast

It seems that, in doing away with patriarchal authority, we have also, perhaps unwittingly, killed off all the grown-ups.

From The Daily Beast

Never mind that the patriarchal belief system woven throughout the cartoon content is itself shockingly outdated.

From The Daily Beast

Because marriage is a patriarchal, sexist institution that should be discarded rather than reformed.

From The Daily Beast

The patriarchal decree of the government was a good deal of a joke on the plains, anyway—except when you were caught defying it!

From Project Gutenberg

It is true that by patriarchal customs and laws Isaac belonged to Abraham as much as if he were a slave or an animal.

From Project Gutenberg

Men in patriarchal times may have committed what we regard as crimes, while their ordinary lives were more virtuous than ours.

From Project Gutenberg

During the patriarchal age the father of the family was priest.

From Project Gutenberg

Indeed, the patriarchal and Jewish religions were mainly typical.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• autocratic
• dictatorial
• imperious
• rigid
• strict
• totalitarian
• tyrannical