Old French-iste, from Latin-ista, -istes, from Greek-istes, from verbs ending in -izein; ➔ -IZE
Examples
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER DICTIONARIES
a Baptist
an Impressionist painter
her feminist views
Marxist theory
the Communist party
1[in nouns] someone who believes in a particular religion or set of principles or ideas: a Buddhist an atheist a Scottish Nationalist2[in adjectives] relating to or showing a particular political or religious belief: her socialist views rightist parties (=political parties with right-wing opinions)3[in nouns] someone who studies a particular subject, plays a particular instrument, or does a particular type of work: a linguist (=someone who studies or learns languages) a novelist (=someone who writes novels) a guitarist (=someone who plays the guitar) a machinist (=someone who operates a machine) →-ologist4[in adjectives] treating people unfairly because of something: a very sexist remark (=making unfair differences between men and women)5[in nouns] someone who treats people unfairly because of something: They’re a bunch of racists.