factish

English

Etymology 1

fact +‎ -ish

Adjective

factish (comparative more factish, superlative most factish)

1. Similar to facts, but not necessarily factual; fact-like.
   • 1971, Frank Lloyd Wright, Louis Henry Sullivan, Genius and the Mobocracy, page 158:

     This factish, leftish derivation of the old dictum, “Art is art precisely in that it is not Nature,” by wrongly interpreting the word Nature, utterly betrayed the master's poetic sense.

   • 2006, Michael Haag, Veronica Haag, James McConnachie, The Rough Guide to the Da Vinci Code, page 224:

     And as Miller writes of Holy Blood, Holy Grail, its real bits are 'factish' rather than 'factual.'

   • 2007, Martin Ray, Thomas Hardy Remembered, page 119:

     all very abstract and not too consistent in view of Hardy's own stories, which were even at that time so seriously attacked, on one side by the realists because they were said to be too unreal, and on the other by the idealists because they were too nakedly factish.

2. Focused on fact rather than reason or speculation.
   • 1876, The Fortnightly - Volume 19; Volume 25, page 223:

     There is no doubt a strong tendency to revolt against abstract reasoning. Human nature has a strong “factish” element in it.

   • 1910, Lindsay Todd Damon, Washington Webster and Lincoln, page 23:

     To this advice may be added the reminder, contained in a word of Walter Bagehot's , that excepting in times of great excitement an audience begins to listen in a decidedly “factish” frame of mind.

   • 2002, Gary Lutz, Stories in the Worst Way, page 108:

     She wanted to know where my youth had gone, how long at current address, what I had to go by, which people I held my life against, reasons for leaving whatever I might have left. But when I started to give her a factish rundown of some sort, keeping my palms up, hair-enshadowed sides down, her eyes went right out.

Etymology 2

Blend of fact +‎ fetish, coined by Bruno Latour.

Noun

factish (plural factishes)

1. (sociology) A scientific "fact" whose power is believed in, but which is ultimately a construction, just as fetishes are constructions believed to hold spiritual powers.
   • 2005, Monika A. Szumilak, Reconfiguring Spanish Subjects, page 93:

     Factishes fit well the emergent and networked vision of the world, because they stress the historical quality with which every acting entity is endowed with.

   • 2012, Mike Michael, Reconnecting Culture, Technology and Nature, page 35:

     If what we have are not fetishes to be critiqued, but factishes that are hybrids that have complex effects, then we must exercise caution and care both in relation to critiquing and creating factishes.

   • 2013, Lucia Thesen, Linda Cooper, Risk in Academic Writing, page 249:

     The factish obliterates the binary between fact and fetish and, more importantly, between Africa and Europe.

Usage notes

The idea of a "factish" emphasizes the provisional nature of all facts according to the scientific method, and the way common culture naively believes in them as solid and immutable.

Related terms

• matter-of-factish

Anagrams

• catfish