Standard Lemma guide
Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.
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noun
A person employed as an official in a bureaucracy (usually corporate or governmental) who holds limited authority and primarily serves to carry out a simple function for which discretion is minimal or not required.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Synonyms: bureaucrat, official, officer, administrator, apparatchik
Antonyms: none provided
noun
Such a person who is petty, pedantic, short-sighted, uncaring, or counterproductive; sometimes also with implication of being amoral or corrupt.
Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract
Synonyms: bureaucrat, apparatchik, paper-pusher, bean counter
Antonyms: none provided
noun
a worker who holds or is invested with an office
Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0
No example sentence was provided for this meaning.
Synonyms: official
Antonyms: none provided
Broader terms: skilled worker, trained worker, skilled workman
Narrower terms: apparatchik, appointee, bailiff, beadle, bureaucrat, administrative official, caretaker, censor, census taker, enumerator, church officer, city father, civil servant, commissar, political commissar, Comptroller General, Comptroller of the Currency, diplomat, diplomatist, elected official, equerry, fire marshall, fire warden, forest fire fighter, ranger, hearing examiner, hearing officer, holdover, hangover, incumbent, officeholder, Inquisitor, invalidator, voider, nullifier, judge, justice, jurist, licenser, macebearer, mace, macer, mandarin, notary, notary public, noticer, officer, agent, federal agent, provincial, postmaster general, proconsul, prosecutor, public prosecutor, prosecuting officer, prosecuting attorney, quaestor, recruiter, registrar, record-keeper, recorder, regulator, returning officer, sealer, searcher, teller, vote counter, town clerk, usher, doorkeeper, vizier, weigher
History
From French fonctionnaire; by surface analysis, function + -ary.
Across languages
41 source translations are retained for this English entry.
