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FOLLOWER
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I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
A person who accepts the leadership of another
Classified under:
Hypernyms ("follower" is a kind of...):
individual; mortal; person; somebody; someone; soul (a human being)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "follower"):
leech; parasite; sponge; sponger (a follower who hangs around a host (without benefit to the host) in hope of gain or advantage)
Machiavellian (a follower of Machiavelli's principles)
Mendelian (a follower of Mendelism)
Mohammedan; Muhammadan; Muhammedan (a follower of Mohammed)
myrmidon (a follower who carries out orders without question)
Nestorian (a follower of Nestorius)
Newtonian (a follower of Isaac Newton)
regular (a dependable follower (especially in party politics))
respecter (a person who respects someone or something; usually used in the negative)
planet; satellite (a person who follows or serves another)
sheep (a docile and vulnerable person who would rather follow than make an independent decision)
Skinnerian (a follower of the theories or methods of B. F. Skinner)
Stalinist (a follower of Stalin and Stalinism)
submitter (someone who yields to the will of another person or force)
hanger-on; tagalong (someone who persistently (and annoyingly) follows along)
feudatory; liege; liege subject; liegeman; vassal (a person holding a fief; a person who owes allegiance and service to a feudal lord)
Wagnerian (a follower of the theories or an admirer of the music of Richard Wagner)
camp follower (a follower who is not a member of an ingroup)
Cartesian (a follower of Cartesian thought)
cultist (a member of a religious cult)
cultist (a member of an unorthodox cult who generally lives outside of conventional society under the direction of a charismatic leader)
adherent; disciple (someone who believes and helps to spread the doctrine of another)
buff; devotee; fan; lover (an ardent follower and admirer)
adulator; flatterer (a person who uses flattery)
flunkey; flunky; stooge; yes-man (a person of unquestioning obedience)
Freudian (a person who follows the basic theories or practices of Sigmund Freud)
Hegelian (a follower of the thought of Hegel)
inferior (one of lesser rank or station or quality)
Jacksonian (a follower of Andrew Jackson or his ideas)
janissary (a loyal supporter)
Jeffersonian (a follower of Thomas Jefferson or his ideas and principles)
Jungian (a follower or advocate of Carl Jung's theories)
Keynesian (a follower of the economic theories of John Maynard Keynes)
Lamarckian (a believer in Lamarckism)
Antonym:
leader (a person who rules or guides or inspires others)
Derivation:
follow (accept and follow the leadership or command or guidance of)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Someone who travels behind or pursues another
Classified under:
Nouns denoting people
Hypernyms ("follower" is a kind of...):
traveler; traveller (a person who changes location)
Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "follower"):
chaser; pursuer (a person who is pursuing and trying to overtake or capture)
shadow (an inseparable companion)
shadow; shadower; tail (a spy employed to follow someone and report their movements)
Derivation:
follow (to travel behind, go after, come after)
follow (follow in or as if in pursuit)
Context examples:
That these were the ornament and bulwark of the kingdom, worthy followers of their most renowned ancestors, whose honour had been the reward of their virtue, from which their posterity were never once known to degenerate.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
Even the stanchest of Spencer's followers will not go farther.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
I am not a pagan, but a Christian philosopher—a follower of the sect of Jesus.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
Many an anxious consultation he held with Black Simon, Sam Aylward, and other of his more experienced followers, as to who should come and who should stay.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
If you are a public figure or influencer, your community of followers and fans will multiply in social media and in other ways, too.
(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)
What a moment that would be when the suspicions of his followers turned to certainty and he and I should have to fight for dear life—he a cripple and I a boy—against five strong and active seamen!
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
After much debate, they concluded unanimously, that I was only relplum scalcath, which is interpreted literally lusus naturæ; a determination exactly agreeable to the modern philosophy of Europe, whose professors, disdaining the old evasion of occult causes, whereby the followers of Aristotle endeavoured in vain to disguise their ignorance, have invented this wonderful solution of all difficulties, to the unspeakable advancement of human knowledge.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
I don't think you have read ten pages of Spencer, but there have been critics, assumably more intelligent than you, who have read no more than you of Spencer, who publicly challenged his followers to adduce one single idea from all his writings—from Herbert Spencer's writings, the man who has impressed the stamp of his genius over the whole field of scientific research and modern thought; the father of psychology; the man who revolutionized pedagogy, so that to-day the child of the French peasant is taught the three R's according to principles laid down by him.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
They too are very hardy soldiers, the more so as for many hundred years they have had to fight hard against the cursed followers of the black Mahound, who have pressed upon them from the south, and still, as I understand, hold the fairer half of the country.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
If you are active in social media, your stars show you will attract followers easily, for your popularity will soar this year.
(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)
