EGOTISM

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does egotism mean? 

• EGOTISM (noun)
  The noun EGOTISM has 2 senses:

1. an exaggerated opinion of your own importance

2. an inflated feeling of pride in your superiority to others

  Familiarity information: EGOTISM used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• EGOTISM (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

An exaggerated opinion of your own importance

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

egotism; self-importance; swelled head

Hypernyms ("egotism" is a kind of...):

conceit; conceitedness; vanity (the trait of being unduly vain and conceited; false pride)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "egotism"):

superiority complex (an exaggerated estimate of your own value and importance)

Derivation:

egotist (a conceited and self-centered person)

egotistic (characteristic of those having an inflated idea of their own importance)

Sense 2

Meaning:

An inflated feeling of pride in your superiority to others

Classified under:

Nouns denoting feelings and emotions

Synonyms:

ego; egotism; self-importance

Hypernyms ("egotism" is a kind of...):

pride; pridefulness (a feeling of self-respect and personal worth)

Derivation:

egotist (a conceited and self-centered person)

egotistic (characteristic of false pride; having an exaggerated sense of self-importance)

 Context examples 

A personality of smallness and egotism and petty underhandedness seemed to emanate from the letters themselves.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

“It seems to me that I have done you full justice in the matter,” I remarked with some coldness, for I was repelled by the egotism which I had more than once observed to be a strong factor in my friend’s singular character.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

This, par parenthese, will be thought cool language by persons who entertain solemn doctrines about the angelic nature of children, and the duty of those charged with their education to conceive for them an idolatrous devotion: but I am not writing to flatter parental egotism, to echo cant, or prop up humbug; I am merely telling the truth.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Something was making him nibble at the edge of stale ideas as if his sturdy physical egotism no longer nourished his peremptory heart.

(The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald)