• sequacity •
Pronunciation: si-kwæ-sê-ti • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Noun, mass (no plural)
Meaning: Followership, a disposition to slavishly follow, incapable of independent or original of thought, intellectually servile.
Notes: In case you ever wondered what the opposite of leadership is, today's Good Word is what it's called. Anyone who slavishly follows the crowd is a candidate for this epithet. This word comes with the accompanying adjective sequacious which, of course, is the source of the adverb sequaciously.
In Play: This Good Word sounds so much like sagacity, people might mistake it for that word. "What the good senator lacks in leadership, he more than makes up for in sequacity." You may substitute any position that requires leadership for senator. Sequacious people are known for their conformism: "Ben Dover is known less for his contributions to the company than for his conformism and sequacity."
Word History: Today's Good Word is taken from the Latin adjective sequax (sequac-s), sequacitas "following, seeking after, pursuing, sequacious", derived from the verb sequi "to follow". We find this sequence of letters in many English words: sequel, non sequitur, segue, subsequent—all with some sense of "following". It comes from an old Proto-Indo-European root sekw- "to follow", which went on to become Sanskrit sacate "accompanies, follows", Lithuanian sekti "to follow", Latvian sekot "to follow", Old Irish sechim "I follow", and Latin secundus "second, the following".
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