corporati

n.pl. (elite or powerful) businesspeople. Subjects: English, Business

Etymological Note: Modeled after literati. Terms with a similar construction are digerati, glitterati, culturati, and blogerati. According to George Mousourakis’s Historical and Institutional Context of Roman Law, during the time of the Roman Empire, corporati were individual members of trade associations called corpora.

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Citations: 1991 Nancy Bartley Seattle Times (Washington) (Dec. 9) “Parties Thank Donors To New Art Museum”: As the hotel lights dimmed, many of the corporati turned into solid tenors and sopranos. Even hotel guests who happened by joined in. 2001 Kalera Stratton Usenet: pdx.singles (Sept. 19) “Re: I’ve had enough!”: I’m really tired of both the corporati and the hippies. Half the time I think the hippies were hired by the anti-free-enterprise corporati to suppress capitalism. 2006 Martin Council Another View (Feb. 27) “The Economics Of The War On Terror: Prosperity The American Way”: This elite was originally a landed aristocracy, but since the late 17th century it has increasingly been a capitalist elite—those who own the means of production. Today it is the corporati—the CEO’s, board members and major equity partners of US multinational corporations. 2006 Matt Thompson Snarkmarket (June 8) “The Press’ New Paradigm”: Besides our inability to parse complex data sets, there are plenty of other reasons why we dropped this story—the business press corps’ formerly cozy relationship with the corporati chief among them. Enron clearly works better as an analogy for the current press paradigm than as a straightforward example.

Posted 13 Jun 06 | Permalink | Tell a Friend