Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
also nonconformity, 1610s, coined in English from non- + conformity. Originally of Church of England clergymen who refused to conform on certain ceremonies.
Usage examples of "non-conformity".
Price advises them to improve upon non-conformity and to set up, each of them, a separate meeting house upon his own particular principles.
In this age the mere example of non-conformity, the mere refusal to bend the knee to custom, is itself a service.
He exacted a rigid conformity to his rules of non-conformity and his scepticism had the absolute accent of a dogma.
It sits in judgment not only on its own townsmen but on the rest of the world -- enlightening, criticising, ostracizing a heedless universe -- and non-conformity to Wentworth standards involves obliteration from Wentworth's consciousness.