Meanings
universalist1
comparative more universalist · superlative most universalist
- Universal in scope.
In tracing the relationships between Western Modernism and the arts of Africa, Oceania and the Americas, the curators took a universalist approach.
2007 January 19, Grace Glueck, “Art in Review”, in New York Times1 more example
In this connection, she notes (1984, p. 42) that in Vata (a language of the Kru family, spoken in the Ivory Coast) the normal word-order is _(VP) XP^✽ V, where XP^✽ represents one or more Complements of the head V of VP, and where V is positioned at the right periphery of V-bar. She notes that in Vata, a finite Clause containing an Auxiliary will have the AUX positioned in I between the subject NP and the VP, with the V positioned at the end of the VP, as in [...] But if I contains no Auxiliary (i.e. is empty), the Verb of the VP will move from V into I, and hence no longer be positioned at the end of VP, but rather in the characteristic I position between NP and VP: cf. [...] Here, the movement of the Verb out of VP-final position ([...]) into I produces an obvious change in the linear ordering of constituents, thus lending clear empirical support to the V MOVEMENT analysis. And Koopman goes on to suggest that given that we have clear empirical motivation for positing a rule of V MOVEMENT for languages such as Vata, universalist considerations argue in favor of adopting the V MOVEMENT analysis rather than the AFFIX MOVEMENT analysis for English, in default of any evidence to the contrary.
1988, Andrew Radford, chapter 8, in Transformational grammar: a first course, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, page 404 - GermanicUSlifestyleFollowing a form of neopaganism, especially Germanic neopaganism, that is supportive of minorities and marginalized groups.
plural universalists
- A proponent of universalism.
The universalists place the active nodes of linguistic life—the deep structures—so deep as to defy observation and description.
1992, Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash, New York: Bantam Books, →ISBN, page 276
Universalist2
Synonyms & antonyms
nounAlternative form of Unitarian Universalist
More synonyms by meaning
adjectiveof or relating to or tending toward universalism
Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.
Origin
Cite this entry
universalist. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/universalist
“universalist.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/universalist. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “universalist,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/universalist.
Source: universalist on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.