reformer
Americannoun
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a person devoted to bringing about significant change in attitudes and practices, such as in politics or society generally or within a particular organization.
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Church History. Reformer, any of the leaders of the Reformation.
Other Word Forms
- antireformer noun
- counterreformer noun
Etymology
Origin of reformer
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
If it is the fate of all men to be eclipsed by time, it is the special fate of the reformers of the day to be swamped by the incoming tide of tomorrow.
A new biography of one of the progressive era’s numerous women reformers makes clear that there was one important difference between then and now.
But for many, the absence of a Capitol tribute underscores a familiar tension: America celebrates its reformers rhetorically, even as its institutions struggle to fully honor them.
From Salon
Social reformers, however, were already hard at work spreading what would be consequential ideas.
“Despite all evidence to the contrary, Marshall still believed,” in Mr. Dikötter’s words, that the Communists “were not doctrinaire ideologists, but merely rural reformers who could help shape a democratic China.”
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
