Radicalizing

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. The act of encouraging or persuading people to adopt extreme viewpoints related to politics, society, or ideology occurs through various methods
2. This process involves the instilling of intense beliefs that frequently oppose established norms or institutions in others
3. The process of causing individuals to embrace extreme views regarding political or social issues can occur through various influencing strategies

Etymology: Radicalizing is the present participle of "radicalize", which the source builds from "radical" plus the suffix "-ize". The suffix has a long lineage: it passed from ancient Greek through Late Latin and Middle French into Middle English, where it took the form "-isen", and it became the English "-ize" in the centuries that followed. Its job is to turn a noun or adjective into a verb meaning "to make or become" something. The base word "radical" comes from Latin "radix", meaning "root", so a radical is literally something that goes to the root of a matter. Adding "-ize" produces a verb meaning to make something go to its roots, or in modern usage, to push a person toward extreme political or social views. The shift from a neutral sense of getting to the root to a sense of becoming extreme happened gradually, as "radical" itself came to describe sweeping reform and then political extremism.

Synonyms: extremizing, revolutionizing