Pollyannaism

English

Alternative forms

• Pollyannism

Etymology

From Pollyanna +‎ -ism.

Noun

Pollyannaism (uncountable)

1. Persistent irrational optimism.

   Synonym: Panglossianism

   Antonyms: cynicalness, cynicism, pessimism, realisticness, realism

   Hypernyms: naivete, naïveté, unrealisticness

   Hyponym: Pollyanna creep

   • 1975 May 9, Germaine Greer, “At the U.N., Women’s Year ‘of Disgrace’”, in New York Times:

     […] 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.

   • 1988, Edmund White, chapter 1, in The Beautiful Room is Empty, New York: Vintage International, published 1994:

     I realize one self-evaluation is as true as another and that my mother’s relentless Pollyannism was a less melancholy and more efficient way of muddling through than my gloom or my sister’s saturnine honesty.

See also

• Mark Tapleyism
• Micawberism