Word.ws English Dictionary

heresthetic

heresthetic noun: the art of political manipulation, especially by the use of language.

Noun

heresthetic (uncountable)

  1. The art of political manipulation, especially by the use of language.
    • Logic is concerned with the truth-value of sentences. Grammar is concerned with the communications-value of sentences. Rhetoric is concerned with the persuasion-value of sentences. And heresthetic is concerned with the strategy-value of sentences. In each case, the art involves the use of language...1986, William H. Riker, The Art of Political Manipulation

Origin of heresthetic

Coined by William Riker, as the companion to rhetoric. From heresy.

Questions about heresthetic

What does heresthetic mean?
Heresthetic means the art of political manipulation, especially by the use of language.
What part of speech is heresthetic?
Heresthetic is a noun.

Words near heresthetic in the dictionary

  1. heresiological
  2. heresiologically
  3. heresiologist
  4. heresiologists
  5. heresiology
  6. heresthetic
  7. heresy
  8. heresyphobia
  9. Heretaungan
  10. Hereth
  11. Herethere

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: heresthetic (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “heresthetic.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/heresthetic. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.