Obstinancy

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A firm adherence to one's opinions or decisions, often leading to stubbornness in the face of reasoned arguments
2. The quality of being unyielding or inflexible, particularly in maintaining one's beliefs or behaviors against persuasion
3. A persistent refusal to change one's course of action despite opposition or feedback, demonstrating a resolve that borders on stubbornness

Etymology: Obstinancy is a close cousin of "obstinance": both descend from the same Latin root, and both reached English as learned borrowings rather than by everyday speech. The root is Latin "obstinare," meaning to persist or set oneself firmly against something, built from "ob-" (against) and "stinare," a verb of uncertain origin that gave the sense of standing fast. Medieval Latin then formed "obstinantia" from that stem, and English took the word directly from that later Latin form. The result is a pair of doublets, two English words from one source that arrived by different routes or at different times, here separated only by their suffixes. "Obstinancy" carries the "-cy" ending that English uses to form abstract nouns of state or quality, so the word names the quality of being obstinate, the firm refusal to give way that the Latin root described.

Synonyms: stubbornness, obstinacy, intransigence, unyieldingness, tenacity

Antonyms: compliance, flexibility, yielding