Intransigent

adjective

Showing a refusal to change, cooperate, or reconsider a stance, especially one which is extreme or controversial

Usage

If you're an American, chances are you've heard people complain about a polarized Congress - that legislators are too wrapped up in their own ideologies to work productively with each other. Adamant about sticking to their political principles, they refuse to even listen to the other side or compromise just a little bit, meaning that no laws get passed, nothing changes, and everyone stays antagonistic to each other. We're not saying anything about this complaint's validity - we're lexicographers, not political analysts. We do, however, love it as an example of what it means to be intransigent and the resentment that can result.

To be intransigent is to be completely and irremediably resistant to change. Intransigent people are about as inflexible as you can get; they're usually so committed to what they're doing or thinking that they refuse to even consider the possibility that they might be wrong or that there could be another way. Whenever it's used, the word conveys a sense of willful immovability: it's not that someone or something intransigent can't change, but simply won't. A person might show such stubbornness in behavior - like, say, how an intransigent old coot would refuse to ditch his ancient suspenders and get with the times - but the word is especially applicable to those who stick dogmatically to beliefs or opinions. In these cases, intransigent often suggests an obstinate adherence to an idea that is extreme or unpopular. Similarly, an idea or behavior can itself be characterized as intransigent if it's born out of a refusal to change or listen to outside opinions.

That idea of "refusing to listen" is pretty essential to the meaning of intransigent. Those who are intransigent are immediately recognizable by the way they completely shut out other people, at least on whatever it is they're so obdurate about. Petition all you want; talk for hours, find archives full of evidence, get down on your knees and beg, but for all the impact it'll have on an intransigent person, you might as well just save your breath. People characterized by this word will be convinced that they are right or that there is no other way, and it'd be hopeless to try to talk them out of it. For this reason, intransigent attitudes are often understood to be frustrating and unhelpful when trying to get things done. Although taking an intransigent stance might feel satisfying in the moment, it can also cause a person to seem extreme, unreasonable, and, sometimes, overly self-interested.

Example: Though we brought him to the library many times, our son maintained his intransigent habit of reading nothing but comic books.

Example: While I personally consider her a villain, my son is intransigent in his insistence that Catwoman is the best superhero.

Example: We remained intransigent in the face of our son's repeated requests to go out at night and "practice vigilante-ing."

Example: I've come to accept my son's intransigent love of wearing cowls in public.

Example: Steve Jobs was known to be intransigent when it came to design aspect of his products.

Origin

Normally when you see a word that starts with the prefix in- (which usually means "not"), you can expect it to be a derivative of whatever term forms its second half. But flipping through a corpus, dictionary, or really any other book, it's doubtful you'll find a mention of the word transigent. That's because intransigent essentially skipped this step in its entry into English. The word's earliest ancestors are the Latin transigere (meaning "to agree upon" or "to complete successfully") and its derivative adjective transigente ("cooperating" or "open to compromise"). The Spanish would add the in- to this word to create intransigente, which, much like its English cousin, meant "refusing to compromise or change." This would inspire copy-cats in other languages, including the French intransigeant and the English intransigent, the first use of which is attributed to the 1870s.

Historically, intransigent and some of its predecessors have also seen intermittent use as nouns. In Spanish, los intransigentes (which means "those who refuse to compromise") was used particularly during the late 19^th century to refer to members of extreme political factions.

Derivative Words

Intransigence, Intransigency: (noun) Intransigence refers to the refusal to change or listen, or to the quality of unyieldingness. Intransigency can also be used to describe this quality, although it's far less common than its companion.

Example: The governor's intransigence on the school budget earned him a reputation as being unfair and unreasonable.

Example: What could have been a productive town hall was instead marked by insults and intransigency.

Intransigent: Intransigent (plural: Intransigents) has been used somewhat rarely as a noun in English to describe "one who holds extreme and uncompromising (especially political) views."

Example: The intransigents in his own party hampered the initiatives of the prime minister.

Intransigently: This adverb characterizes a verb, adjective, or other adverb as revealing or related to a refusal to reconsider or be reasoned with.

Example: Though everyone in the building complained, our neighbor intransigently refused to turn down her music.

Example: We begged and pleaded that she lower the volume by just a few decibels, but she stayed intransigently callous.

Similar Words

So if you can't use transigent as the opposite of intransigent, what are your other options? You might be tempted to turn to transient, which sort of works. Transient most often describes things as lasting only a short period of time or not staying in one place for very long (though it can also be used as a noun to refer to someone who moves from place to place a lot). Both intransigent and transient contain a form of the Latin root trans-, which means "across" or "through" (explaining its role in words like transport and translate). The presence of trans- indicates that both have something to do with movement, though in different ways. Intransigent has a figurative relation to movement, suggesting that someone refuses to mentally or psychologically budge. Transient, however, can be either figurative or literal, only characterizing something as constantly changing, moving, or just passing through.

In Literature

From Ayn Rand's Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal:

A rational mind does not work under compulsion; it does not subordinate its grasp of reality to anyone’s orders, directives, or controls…It is from the work and the inviolate integrity of such minds—from the intransigent innovators—that all of mankind’s knowledge and achievements have come. (See The Fountainhead.) It is to such minds that mankind owes its survival. (See Atlas Shrugged.)

Intransigent is used in this passage to characterize fecund innovators who refuse to abandon their interests or change their mindsets to suit the wants of others. According to Rand (a doyen of intransigent pursuit of self-interest), it is these inventors who keep society advancing.

Mnemonic

Intransigent has an intractable opinion
Intransigent's not interested in changing its mind