Meanings
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1
noun
a preacher who conducts Christian religious revivals, often traveling between communities
The revivalist warned the crowd to repent before the meeting ended.
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2
noun
a person who seeks to restore a neglected style, practice, belief, or tradition
The designer became known as a revivalist of nineteenth-century decorative arts.
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3
adj
relating to religious revival or to the restoration of an earlier style or practice
The chapel became a center of revivalist preaching.
Thesaurus
Etymology
From revival + -ist, first recorded in the early nineteenth century for a preacher who organized religious revivals. It later broadened to anyone who deliberately restores or renews an older artistic style, custom, movement, or practice.