Word.ws English Dictionary

occhiolism

UK/ˈəʊkjəʊˌlɪzəm/US/ˈoʊkjoʊˌlɪzəm/

occhiolism noun: the awareness of the small scope of one's own perspective and the way it limits one's ability to fully understand the world.

Noun

occhiolism (uncountable)

  1. (neologism, rare) The awareness of the small scope of one's own perspective and the way it limits one's ability to fully understand the world.
    • I've never been consumed by so much occhiolism, I was so small so insignificant.2015, Johnny Close, Eco-Lonely, page 186
    • Willow is a building site when I reach the top. It's barely recognisable as the place I had held a vimto-coke in one hand and an optimistic sense of occhiolism in the other merely 24 hours ago. The same people who served me several shots at the now dismantled bar are busying themselves with tearing...2015 September 29, Tom Butler-Roberts, “Tommy Fong's Final Farewell”, in York Vision, The University of York, page 11

Origin of occhiolism

Coined by American author and neologist John Koenig, creator of The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, from Italian occhiolino (“little eye”), the name given by inventor Galileo to a prototype microscope in the early 1600s, + -ism.

Questions about occhiolism

What does occhiolism mean?
Occhiolism means the awareness of the small scope of one's own perspective and the way it limits one's ability to fully understand the world.
What part of speech is occhiolism?
Occhiolism is a noun.
How do you pronounce occhiolism?
Occhiolism is pronounced /ˈəʊkjəʊˌlɪzəm/ (UK).

Words near occhiolism in the dictionary

  1. occation
  2. OCCB
  3. occecation
  4. occerence
  5. occhio
  6. occhiolism
  7. occhios
  8. occident
  9. occidental
  10. Occidental Mindoro
  11. occidentalise

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: occhiolism (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: “occhiolism.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/occhiolism. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.