Word.ws English Dictionary

Pollyannism

Pollyannism is the alternative form of Pollyannaism.

Meaning of Pollyannaism

Noun

Pollyannaism (uncountable)

  1. Persistent irrational optimism.
    • […] some good guys at the Secretariat decided that 1975 should be International Women’s Year. ¶ It is typical of the special brand of United Nations Pollyannaism that they did so regardless of the fact that Secretariat hiring policies are grossly discriminatory.1975 May 9, Germaine Greer, “At the U.N., Women’s Year ‘of Disgrace’”, in The New York Times, archived from the original on 03 Sep 2025
    Synonyms:
    Panglossianism

Questions about Pollyannism

What is Pollyannism the alternative form of?
Pollyannism is the alternative form of Pollyannaism.

Words near Pollyannism in the dictionary

  1. pollyannaish
  2. Pollyannaishly
  3. Pollyannaism
  4. pollyannas
  5. pollyannish
  6. Pollyannism
  7. pollyblobs
  8. pollyfox
  9. pollyfoxed
  10. pollyfoxes
  11. pollyfoxing

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Pollyannism (page history and authors); Pollyannaism (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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