Editing Utopia (section)

==Etymology and history==
The word [[Wiktionary:utopia|''utopia'']] was coined in 1516 from [[Ancient Greek]] by the Englishman [[Sir Thomas More]] for his Latin text ''[[Utopia (More book)|Utopia]]''. It literally translates as "no place", coming from the {{langx|el|οὐ}} ("not") and τόπος ("place"), and meant any non-existent society, when 'described in considerable detail'.<ref>{{cite web |title=Definitions {{!}} Utopian Literature in English: An Annotated Bibliography From 1516 to the Present |url=https://openpublishing.psu.edu/utopia/content/definitions |website=openpublishing.psu.edu |access-date=4 September 2022|archive-date=4 September 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220904090946/https://openpublishing.psu.edu/utopia/content/definitions |url-status=live }}</ref> However, in standard usage, the word's meaning has [[semantic change|shifted]] and now usually describes a non-existent society that is intended to be viewed ''as considerably better'' than contemporary society.<ref name="Thinking Utopia">{{cite report |periodical=Thinking Utopia: Steps into Other Worlds |pages=11 |last=Sargent |first=Lyman Tower |title=The Necessity of Utopian Thinking: A cross-national perspective |editor1-last=Rüsen |editor1-first=Jörn |editor2-last=Fehr |editor2-first=Michael |editor3-last=Reiger |editor3-first=Thomas W. |year=2005 |publisher=Berghahn Books |isbn=978-1-57181-440-1 |location=New York}}</ref>

In his original work, More carefully pointed out the similarity of the word to ''eutopia'', meaning "good place", from {{langx|el|εὖ}} ("good" or "well") and τόπος ("place"), which ostensibly would be the more appropriate term for the concept in modern English. The pronunciations of ''eutopia'' and ''utopia'' in [[English language|English]] are [[homophone|identical]], which may have given rise to the change in meaning.<ref name="Thinking Utopia"/><ref>{{cite book |title=Utopian Reality: Reconstructing culture in revolutionary Russia and beyond |last1=Lodder |first1=C. |last2=Kokkori |first2=M |last3=Mileeva |first3=M. |pages=1–9 |isbn=978-90-04-26320-8 |publisher=Koninklijke Brill NV |location=Leiden, The Netherlands |year=2013}}</ref> ''Dystopia'', a term meaning "bad place" coined in 1868, draws on this latter meaning. The opposite of a utopia, ''[[dystopia]]'' is a concept which surpassed ''utopia'' in popularity in the [[utopian and dystopian fiction|fictional literature]] from the 1950s onwards, chiefly because of the impact of George Orwell's ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]''.

In 1876, writer [[Charles Renouvier]] published a novel called ''[[Uchronia]]'' ([[French language|French]] ''Uchronie'').<ref>{{citation|title=Uchronia: Uchronie (l'utopie dans l'histoire), esquisse historique apocryphe du développement de la civilisation européenne tel qu'il n'a pas été, tel qu'il aurait pu être|url=http://www.uchronia.net/bib.cgi/label.html?id=renouchron|publisher=Uchronia.net|access-date=2011-10-01|archive-date=2021-03-11|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210311164457/http://www.uchronia.net/bib.cgi/label.html?id=renouchron|url-status=live}}, reprinted 1988, {{ISBN|2-213-02058-2}}.</ref> The [[neologism]], using ''chronos'' instead of ''topos'', has since been used to refer to non-existent idealized times in fiction, such as [[Philip Roth]]'s ''[[The Plot Against America]]'' (2004)'',<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Douglas|first=Christopher|date=2013|title="Something That Has Already Happened": Recapitulation and Religious Indifference in The Plot Against America|journal=MFS Modern Fiction Studies|volume=59|issue=4|pages=784–810|doi=10.1353/mfs.2013.0045|issn=1080-658X|s2cid=162310618}}</ref>'' and [[Philip K. Dick]]'s ''[[The Man in the High Castle]]'' (1962)''.<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Fondanèche|first1=Daniel|last2=Chatelain|first2=Danièle|last3=Slusser|first3=George|date=1988|title=Dick, the Libertarian Prophet (Dick: une prophète libertaire)|journal=Science Fiction Studies|volume=15|issue=2|pages=141–151|issn=0091-7729|jstor=4239877}}</ref>''

According to the ''Philosophical Dictionary'', proto-utopian ideas begin as early as the period of [[ancient Greece]] and Rome, [[Heretics|medieval heretics]], [[Peasants' Revolt|peasant revolts]] and establish themselves in the period of the early capitalism, [[reformation]] and [[Renaissance]] ([[Jan Hus|Hus]], [[Müntzer]], [[Thomas More|More]], [[Tommaso Campanella|Campanella]]), [[democratic revolutions]] ([[Jean Meslier|Meslier]], [[Morelly]], [[Gabriel Bonnot de Mably|Mably]], [[Gerrard Winstanley|Winstanley]], later [[Babeuf]]ists, [[Blanquism|Blanquists]],) and in a period of turbulent development of capitalism that highlighted antagonisms of [[capitalist society]] ([[Henri de Saint-Simon|Saint-Simon]], [[Charles Fourier|Fourier]], [[Robert Owen|Owen]], [[Cabet]], [[Lamennais]], [[Proudhon]] and their followers).<ref>Filozofický slovník 1977, s. 561</ref>