GRE Basic

eclectic

- made up of a variety of sources or styles - ECLECTIC: selecting from or made up from a variety of sources Ex: Budapest's architecture is an ECLECTIC mix of eastern and western styles. Words with similar meanings: SELECTIVE CATHOLIC BROAD

demure

affectedly modest or shy especially in a playful or provocative way

flamboyant

elaborately or excessively ornamented

conspire

engage in plotting or enter into a conspiracy, swear together

warranted

justified; authorized

broach

bring up a topic for discussion BROACH (brohch) v to open up a subject for discussion, often a del i cate subject • Henrietta was proud of her new dress, so no one knew how to broach the subject with her of how silly grandmothers look in leather.

arrest

cause to stop

benign

pleasant and beneficial in nature or influence BENIGN (bih NYNE) adj gentle; not harmful; kind; mild •Karla has a benign personality; she is not at all unpleasant to be with. •The threat of revolution turned out to be benign; nothing much came of it. •Charlie was worried that he had cancer, but the lump on his leg turned out to be benign. The difference between a benign person and a benevolent (see sepa rate entry) one is that the benevolent one is actively kind and gen er ous while the benign one is more passive. Benevolence is usually active generosity or kindness, while benignancy tends to mean sim ply not causing harm. The opposite of a benign tumor is a malignant one. This is a tumor that can kill you. A malignant personality is one you wish a surgeon would remove. Malignant means nasty, evil, full of ill will. The word malignant also conveys a sense that evil is spread ing, as with a cancer. An adjective that means the same thing is malign. As a verb, malign has a different meaning. To malign someone is to say unfairly bad things about that person, to injure that person by telling evil lies about him or her. Slander and malign are synonyms.

bombast

pompous or pretentious talk or writing

affectation

unnatural or artificial behavior, usually intended to impress AFFECTATION (af ek TAY shun) n unnatural or artificial behavior, usually intended to impress •Becky's English accent is an affectation. She spent only a week in England, and that was several years ago. •Elizabeth had somehow acquired the absurd affectation of pretending that she didn't know how to turn on a television set. A person with an affectation is said to be affected. To affect a characteristic or habit is to adopt it consciously, usually in the hope of impressing other people. • Edward affected to be more of an artist than he really was. Every one hated him for it.

ingenuity

the power of creative imagination

plasticity

the property of being physically malleable

buttress

(v.) to support, prop up, strengthen; (n.) a supporting structure

STRIFE

STRIFE (stryfe) n bitter conflict; discord; a struggle or clash • Marital strife often leads to divorce.

castigation

- Castigate someone is to reprimand harshly. Very similar to chastise. punishment; severe criticism or disapproval

enervate

- ENERVATE: to reduce in strength The guerrillas hoped that a series of surprise attacks would ENERVATE the regular army. ENERVATE (EN ur vayt) v to reduce the strength or energy of, es pe cial ly to do so gradually •Sander felt enervated by his long ordeal and couldn't make himself get out of bed. •Clinging to a flagpole for a month without food or water enervated me, and one day I fell asleep and fell off. •Life itself seemed to enervate the old man. He grew weaker and paler with every breath he drew.

euphemism

- EUPHEMISM: use of an inoffensive word or phrase in place of a more distasteful one The funeral director preferred to use the EUPHEMISM "sleeping" instead of the word "dead." EUPHEMISM (YOO fuh miz um) n a pleasant or inoffensive expression used in place of an unpleasant or offensive one •Aunt Angie, who couldn't bring herself to say the word death, said that Uncle George had taken the big bus uptown. "Taking the big bus uptown" was her euphemism for dying. •The sex-education instructor wasn't very effective. She was so embarrassed by the subject that she could only bring herself to speak euphemistically about it.

audacious

- a willingness to take bold risks (good thing); disposed to venture or take risks Ex: the new CEO pursued audacious initiatives to save the company from bankruptcy. - showing a lack of respect Ex: The student's audacious remark earned her a seat in afternoon detention.

commensurate

- To be commensurate to is to be in proportion or corresponding in degree or amount. The definition of this word tends to be a little unwieldy, regardless of the source. Therefore, it is a word that screams to be understood in context (for this very reason, the GRE loves commensurate, because they know that those who just devour flashcards will not understand how the word works in a sentences). Speaking of a sentence... The convicted felon's life sentence was commensurate to the heinousness of his crime. - corresponding in size or degree or extent

deference

- a disposition or tendency to yield to the will of others - DEFERENCE: respect, courtesy Ex: The respectful young law clerk treated the Supreme Court justice with the utmost DEFERENCE. Related words: DEFER: to delay; to show someone deference DEFERENT: courteous and respectful Words with similar meanings: COURTESY HONOR HOMAGE OBEISANCE RESPECT REVERENCE VENERATION

eulogy

- a formal expression of praise - EULOGY: speech in praise of someone His best friend gave the EULOGY, outlining his many achievements and talents. Words with similar meanings: COMMEND EXTOL LAUD

chauvinist

- a person with a prejudiced belief in the superiority of his or her own kind - CHAUVINIST: someone prejudiced in favor of a group to which he or she belongs The attitude that men are inherently superior to women and therefore must be obeyed is common among male CHAUVINISTS. Words with similar meanings: PARTISAN

equivocate

- be deliberately ambiguous or unclear in order to mislead or withhold information - EQUIVOCATE: to use expressions of double meaning in order to mislead When faced with criticism of his policies, the politician EQUIVOCATED and left all parties thinking he agreed with them. Related Words: EQUIVOCAL: undecided; trying to deceive EQUIVOCATION: the act or state of equivocating Words with similar meanings: AMBIGUOUS EVASIVE WAFFLING

abate

- become less in amount or intensity - ABATE (uh BAYT) v to subside; to reduce •George spilled a pot of hot coffee on his leg. It hurt quite a bit. Then, gradually, the agony abated. •Bad weather abates when good weather begins to return. A rainstorm that does not let up continues unabated. A tax abatement is a reduction in taxes. Businesses are some times given tax abatements in return for building factories in places where there is a particular need for jobs.

impetuous

- characterized by undue haste and lack of thought or deliberation - IMPETUOUS: quick to act without thinking It is not good for an investment broker to be IMPETUOUS, since much thought should be given to all the possible options. Related Words: IMPETUS: impulse Words with similar meanings: IMPULSIVE PRECIPITATE RASH RECKLESS SPONTANEOUS

estimable

- deserving of respect or high regard - ESTIMABLE: admirable Most people consider it ESTIMABLE that Mother Teresa spent her life helping the poor of India. Related Words: ESTEEM: high regard Words with similar meanings: ADMIRABLE COMMENDABLE CREDITABLE HONOWLE LAUDABLE MERITORIOUS PRAISEWORTHY RESPECTABLE VENERABLE WORTHY

enumerate

- determine the number or amount of - ENUMERATE: to count, list, or itemize Moses returned from the mountain with tablets on which the commandments were ENUMERATED. Words with similar meanings: CATALOG INDEX TABULATE

ephemeral

- enduring a very short time EPHEMERAL: lasting a short time The lives of mayflies seem EPHEMERAL to us, since the flies' average life span is a matter of hours. EPHEMERAL (i FEM ur al) adj lasting a very short time Ephemeral comes from the Greek and means lasting a single day. The word is usually used more loosely to mean lasting a short time. Youth and flowers are both ephemeral. They're gone before you know it. Some friendships are ephemeral. • The tread on those used tires will probably turn out to be ephemeral.

articulate

- expressing yourself easily or characterized by clear expressive language - ARTICULATE: able to speak clearly and expressively Ex: She is such an ARTICULATE defender of labor that unions are among her strongest supporters. Words with similar meanings ELOQUENT EXPRESSIVE FLUENT LUClD SILVER-TONGUED SMOOTH-SPOKEN

eloquent

- expressing yourself readily, clearly, effectively - ELOQUENT: persuasive and moving, especially in speech The Gettysburg Address is moving not only because of its lofty sentiments but also because of its ELOQUENT words. Words with similar meanings: ARTICULATE EXPRESSIVE MEANINGFUL SIGNIFICANT FLUENT SMOOTH-SPOKEN

ardor

- feelings of great warmth and intensity - ARDOR: intense and passionate feeling Ex: Bishop's ARDOR for landscape was evident when he passionately described the beauty of the scenic Hudson Valley. Related words: ARDENT: expressing ardor; passionate Words with similar meanings: DEVOTION ENTHUSIASM FERVENCY FERVIDITY FERVIDNESS FERVOR FIRE PASSION ZEAL ZEALOUSNESS

disparate

- fundamentally different or distinct in quality or kind - DISPARATE: fundamentally different; entirely unlike Ex: Although the twins appear to be identical physically, their personalities are DISPARATE. Words with similar meanings: DIFFERENT DISSIMILAR DIVERGENT DIVERSE VARIANT VARIOUS

aggregate

- gather in a mass, sum, or whole - AGGREGATE (AG ruh gut) n sum total; a collection of separate things mixed together • Chili is an aggregate of meat and beans. Aggregate (AG ruh gayt) can also be a verb or an adjective. You would make chili by aggregating meat and beans. Chili is an aggregate (AG ruh gut) food. Similar and related words include congregate, segregate, and integrate. To aggregate is to bring together; to congregate is to get together; to segregate is to keep apart (or separate); to in te grate is to unite.

belligerent

- given to fighting, warlike; combative, aggressive; one at war, one engaged in war - BELLIGERENT (buh LIJ ur unt) adj combative; quarrelsome; waging war • Al was so belligerent that the convention had the feel of a boxing match. A bully is belligerent. To be belligerent is to push other people around, to be noisy and argumentative, to threaten other people, and generally to make a nuisance of oneself. Opposing armies in a war are referred to as belligerents. Sometimes one belligerent in a conflict is more belligerent than the other.

acrid

- harsh in taste or odor; sharp in manner or temper - ACRID (AK rid) adj harshly pungent; bitter •The chili we had at the party had an acrid taste; it was harsh and unpleasant. •Long after the fire had been put out, we could feel the acrid sting of smoke in our nostrils. Acrid is used most often with tastes and smells, but it can be used more broadly to describe anything that is offensive in a similar way. A comment that stung like acid could be called acrid. So could a harsh personality.

dissemble

- hide under a false appearance - DISSEMBLE: to present a false appearance; to disguise one's real intentions or character Ex: The villain could DISSEMBLE to the police no longer-he admitted the deed and tore up the floor to reveal the body of the old man. Words with similar meanings: ACT AFFECT ASSUME CAMOUFLAGE CLOAK COUNTERFEIT COVER UP DISGUISE DISSIMULATE FAKE FEIGN MASK MASQUERADE POSE PRETEND PUT ON SHAM SIMULATE

implacable

- impossible to placate - IMPLACABLE: unable to be calmed down or made peaceful His rage at the betrayal was so great that he remained IMPLACABLE for weeks. Related Words: PLACATE: to make peaceful Words with similar meanings: INEXORABLE INTRANSIGENT IRRECONCILABLE RELENTLESS REMORSELESS UNFORGIVING UNRELENTING

capricious

- impulsive and unpredictable - CAPRICIOUS: changing one's mind quickly and often Ex: Queen Elizabeth I was quite CAPRICIOUS; her courtiers could never be sure which of their number would catch her fancy. Related words: CAPRICE: whim, sudden fancy Words with similar meanings: ARBITRARY CHANCE CHANGEABLE ERRATIC FICKLE INCONSTANT MERCURIAL RANDOM WHIMSICAL WILLFUL

insipid

- lacking interest or significance - INSIPID: lacking interest or flavor The critic claimed that the painting was INSIPID, containing no interesting qualities at all. Words with similar meanings: BANAL. BLAND DULL STALE VAPID

abject

- most unfortunate or miserable - ABJECT (AB jekt) adj hopeless; extremely sad and ser vile; de feat ed • While most people would quickly recover from a banana-peel accident, Mia felt abject humiliation. An abject person is one who is crushed and without hope. A slave would be abject, in all likelihood. Perhaps 90 percent of the time, when you en coun ter this word it will be followed by the word poverty. Abject poverty is hope less, desperate pov er ty. The phrase "abject poverty" is overused. Writ ers use it because they are too lazy to think of anything original.

imperturbable

- not easily perturbed or excited or upset - IMPERTURBABLE: not capable of being disturbed The counselor had so much experience dealing with distraught children that she seemed IMPERTURBABLE, even when faced with the wildest tantrums. Related Words: PERTURB: to disturb greatly Words with similar meanings: COMPOSED DISPASSIONATE IMPASSIVE SERENE STOICAL

austere

- of a stern or strict bearing or demeanor - AUSTERE: severe or stern in appearance; undecorated The lack of decoration makes Zen temples seem AUSTERE to the untrained eye. Related words: AUSTERITY: severity, especially poverty Words with similar meanings: BLEAK DOUR GRIM HARD HARSH SEVERE AUSTERE (aw STEER) adj unadorned; stern; forbidding; with out excess • The Smiths' house was austere; there was no furniture in it, and there was nothing hanging on the walls. • Quentin, with his austere personality, didn't make many friends. Most people were too intimidated by him to introduce themselves and say hello. The noun austerity (aw STER uh tee) is generally used to mean roughly the same thing as poverty. To live in austerity is to live without com forts. • Conditions in Austria were very austere after the war.

exculpate

- pronounce not guilty of criminal charges - EXCULPATE: to clear from blame; prove innocent The adversarial legal system is intended to convict those who are guilty and to EXCULPATE those who are innocent. Words with similar meanings: ABSOLVE ACQUIT CLEAR EXONERATE VINDICATE

frugality

- prudence in avoiding waste -a tendency to be thrifty or cheap. Scrooge McDuck's FRUGALITY was so great that he accumulated enough wealth to fill a giant storehouse with money. Words with similar meanings: ECONOMICAL PARSIMONY PRUDENCE SPARING

advocate

- publicly recommend or suport. - speak, plead, or argue in favour of ex: The governor chose to advocate for a higher minimum wage rather than a tax incentive. ADVOCATE: to speak in favor of The vegetarian ADVOCATED a diet containing no meat. Related words: ADVOCACY: active support for Words with similar meanings: BACK CHAMPION SUPPORT

arcane

- requiring secret or mysterious knowledge - ARCANE (ahr KAYN) adj mys te ri ous; known only to a select few •The rites of the secret cult were arcane; no one outside the cult knew what they were. •The arcane formula for the cocktail was scrawled on a faded scrap of paper. •We could make out only a little of the arcane inscription on the old trunk.

adherent

- someone who believes and helps to spread the doctrine of another - ADHERENT (ad HEER unt) n follower; supporter; believer • The king's adherents threw a big birthday party for him, just to show how much they liked him To adhere to something is to stick to it. Adherents are people who adhere to, or stick to, something or someone. Following someone or something, especially rules or laws, is adherence. A religion could be said to have adherents, assuming there are people who believe in it. Governments, causes, ideas, people, philosophies, and many other things can have adherents, too.

emulate

- strive to equal or match, especially by imitating - EMULATE: to copy; to try to equal or excel The graduate student sought to EMULATE his professor in every way, copying not only how she taught, but also how she conducted herself outside of class. Words with similar meanings: APE IMITATE SIMULATE EMULATE (EM yuh layt) v to strive to equal or excel, usually through imitation •To emulate someone is to try to be just as good as, or better than, him or her. •The American company emulated its successful Japanese competitor but never quite managed to do as well. •Little Joey imitated his athletic older brother in the hope of one day emulating his success. •I got ahead by emulating those who had gone before me.

bolster

- support and strengthen - BOLSTER: to support; to prop up Ex: The presence of giant footprints BOLSTERED the argument that Sasquatch was in the area. Words with similar meanings: BRACE BUTTRESS PROP SUPPORT SUSTAIN UNDERPIN UPHOLD

acquiesce

- to agree or express agreement - ACQUIESCE (ak wee ES) v to comply passively; to accept; to as sent; to agree • The pirates asked Pete to walk the plank; he took one look at their swords and then acquiesced. To acquiesce is to do something without objection—to do it quietly. As the similarity of their spellings indicates, the words acquiesce and quiet are closely related. They are both based on Latin words meaning rest or be quiet. Acquiesce is sometimes used sloppily as a simple synonym for agree in situations in which it isn't really appropriate. For example, it isn't really possible to acquiesce noisily, enthusiastically, or eagerly. Don't forget the quiet in the middle. To acquiesce is to exhibit acquiescence.

allege

- to assert without proof or confirmation - ALLEGE (uh LEJ) v to assert without proof • If I say, "Cedrick alleges that I stole his hat," I am saying two things: 1. Cedrick says I stole his hat. 2. I say I didn't do it. To allege something is to assert it without proving it. Such an assertion is called an allegation (al uh GAY shun). The adjective is alleged (uh LEJD). If the police accuse someone of having committed a crime, newspapers will usually refer to that person as an alleged criminal. • The police have alleged that he or she committed the crime, but a jury hasn't made a decision yet.

amalgamate

- to bring or combine together or with something else - AMALGAMATE: to combine; to mix together. Ex: Giant Industries AMALGAMATED with Mega Products to form Giant-Mega Products Incorporated. Related Words: AMALGAM: a mixture, especially of two metals Words with similar meanings: ADMIX BLEND COMBINE COMMINGLE COMMIX COMPOUND FUSE INTERMINGLE INTERMIX MERGE MINGLE MIX

engender

- to cause, to produce, to create - ENGENDER: to produce, cause, or bring about His fear and hatred of clowns was ENGENDERED when he witnessed the death of his father at the hands of a clown. - ENGENDER (en JEN dur) v to bring into existence; to create; to cause •My winning lottery ticket engendered a great deal of envy among my co-workers; they all wished that they had won. •Smiles en gen der smiles. •The bitter lieutenant engendered dis con tent among his troops.

admonish

- to caution or advise against something; to scold mildly; to remind of a duty ADMONISH (ad MAHN ish) v to scold gently; to warn • The boys' father admonished them not to eat the pie he had just baked. When they did so anyway, he admonished them. In the first sentence admonish means warn; in the second it means scold gently. Consider yourself admonished not to misuse this word. The noun is admonition (ad muh NISH un) and the adjective is admonitory (ad MAHN i tor ee). SCOLD = (V.) remonstrate with or rebuke (someone) angrily. (N.) a woman who nags or grumbles constantly.

corroborate

- to corroborate something is to confirm or lend support to (usually an idea or a claim) -establish or strengthen as with new evidence or facts CORROBORATE (kuh ROB uh rayt) v to confirm; to back up with evidence •I knew my statement was correct when my colleague corroborated it. •Henny Penny's contention that the sky was falling could not be cor rob o rat ed. That is, no one was able to find any fallen sky. •The police could find no evidence of theft and thus could not cor rob o rate Greg's claim that he had been robbed.

disabuse

- to free from deception or error, set right in ideas or thinking - DISABUSE: to set right; to free from error Ex: Galilee's observations DISABUSED scholars of the notion that the Sun revolved around the Earth. Words with similar meanings: CORRECT UNDECEIVE

ameliorate

- to make better - AMELIORATE: to make better; to improve The doctor was able to AMELIORATE the patient's suffering using painkillers. Words with similar meanings: AMEND BETTER IMPROVE PACIFY UPGRADE

deride

- treat or speak of with contempt - DERIDE: to speak of or treat with contempt; to mock Ex: The awkward child was often DERIDED by his "cooler" peers. Related words: DERISION: mockery and tauntsDERIDE: to speak of or treat with contempt; to mock The awkward child was often DERIDED by his "cooler" peers. Related words: DERISION: mockery and taunts

FLOUT

- treat with contemptuous disregard - FLOUT (flowt) v to disregard something out of disrespect • A driver flouts the traffic laws by driving through red lights and knocking down pedestrians. To flaunt success is to make certain everyone knows that you are successful. To flout success is to be contemptuous of success or to act as though it means nothing at all.

fawn

- try to gain favor by cringing or flattering - FAWN: to grovel The understudy FAWNED over the director in hopes of being cast in the part on a permanent basis. Words with similar meanings: BOOTLICK GROVEL TOADY PANDER

innocuous

- unlikely to harm or disturb anyone - INNOCUOUS: harmless Some snakes are poisonous, but most species are INNOCUOUS and pose no danger to humans. Words with similar meanings: BENIGN HARMLESS INOFFENSIVE

digress

- wander from a direct or straight course DIGRESS (dye GRES) v to stray from the main subject Speaking metaphorically, to digress is to leave the main high way in order to travel aimlessly on back roads. When a speaker digresses, he departs from the main topic and tells a story only distantly related to it. Such a story is called a digression. Some times a writer's or speaker's digressions are more interesting than his or her main points. • After a lengthy digression, the lecturer returned to his speech and brought it to a conclusion.

AXIOM

AXIOM (AK see um) n a self-evident rule or truth; a widely ac cept ed saying "Everything that is living dies" is an axiom. An axiom in geometry is a rule that doesn't have to be proved because its truth is accepted as obvious, self-evident, or un prov able.

debacle

A complete failure; a total collapse DEBACLE (di BAHK ul) n violent break down; sudden over throw; overwhelming defeat • A political debate would become a debacle if the candidates began screaming and throwing dinner rolls at each other. This word can also be pronounced "day BAHK ul."

ADROIT

ADROIT (uh DROYT) adj skillful; dexterous; clever; shrewd; socially at ease • Julio was an adroit salesperson: His highly skilled pitch, backed up by extensive product knowledge, nearly always resulted in a sale. Adroit comes from the French word for right (as in the direction), and refers to an old superstition that right-handedness is superior. It's a synonym of dexterous (which comes from the Latin for right) and an antonym of gauche and maladroit. • My brilliant accountant adroitly whipped my taxes into shape, then made a gauche remark about my ignorance of financial matters.

ADVERSE

ADVERSE (ad VURS) adj unfavorable; antagonistic • We had to play our soccer match under adverse conditions: It was snowing and only three members of our team had bothered to show up. Airplanes often don't fly in adverse weather. An airplane that took off in bad weather and reached its destination safely would be said to have overcome adversity. Adversity means misfortune or unfavorable circumstances. To do something "in the face of adversity" is to undertake a task despite obstacles. Some people are at their best in adversity because they rise to the occasion. A word often confused with adverse is averse (uh VURS). The two are related but they don't mean quite the same thing. A person who is averse to doing something is a person who doesn't want to do it. To be averse to something is to be opposed to doing it—to have an aversion to doing it.

AFFLUENT

AFFLUENT (AF loo unt) adj rich; prosperous A person can be affluent; all it takes is money. A country can be affluent, too, if it's full of affluent people. Affluence means the same thing as wealth or prosperity.

ALACRITY

ALACRITY (uh LAK ri tee) n cheerful eagerness or readiness to respond • David could hardly wait for his parents to leave; he carried their luggage out to the car with great alacrity.

ALLEVIATE

ALLEVIATE (uh LEE vee ayt) v to relieve, usually temporarily or incompletely; to make bearable; to lessen •Visiting the charming pet cemetery alleviated the woman's grief over the death of her canary. •Aspirin alleviates headache pain. When your headache comes back, take some more aspirin.

ALLOCATE

ALLOCATE (AL uh kayt) v to distribute; to assign; to allot •The long car trip had been a big failure, and David, Aaliyah, and Jan spent several hours attempting to allocate the blame. In the end, they decided it had all been Jan's fault. •The office manager had allocated just seven paper clips for our entire department.

ALLOY

ALLOY (AL oy) n a combination of two or more things, usually metals • Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc. That is, you make brass by combining copper and zinc. Alloy (uh LOY) is often used as a verb. To alloy two things is to mix them together. There is usually an implication that the mix ture is less than the sum of the parts. That is, there is often some thing undesirable or debased about an alloy (as opposed to a pure sub stance).

allusion

ALLUSION (uh LOO zhun) n an indirect reference (often to a literary work); a hint To allude to something is to refer to it indirectly. • When Ralph said, "I sometimes wonder whether to be or not to be," he was alluding to a famous line in Hamlet. If Ralph had said, "As Hamlet said, 'To be or not to be, that is the question,'" his statement would have been a direct reference, not an allusion. An allusion is an allusion only if the source isn't identified directly. Anything else is a reference or a quotation. • If Andrea says, "I enjoyed your birthday party," she isn't alluding to the birthday party; she's mentioning it. But if she says, "I like the way you blow out candles," she is alluding to the party.

ALOOF

ALOOF (uh LOOF) adj uninvolved; standing off; keeping one's distance • Al, on the roof, felt very aloof. To stand aloof from a touch-football game is to stand on the side lines and not take part. Cats are often said to be aloof because they usually mind their own business and don't crave the affection of people. STANDOFFISH = distant and cold in manner; unfriendly.

AMBIVALENT

AMBIVALENT (am BIV uh lunt) adj undecided; having opposed feelings simultaneously • Susan felt ambivalent about George as a boyfriend. Her fre quent desire to break up with him reflected this ambivalence.

AMORAL

AMORAL (ay MOR ul) adj lacking a sense of right and wrong; neither good nor bad, neither moral nor immoral; without moral feel ings • Very young children are amoral; when they cry, they aren't being bad or good—they're merely doing what they have to do. A moral person does right; an immoral person does wrong; an amoral person simply does.

AWRY

AWRY (uh RYE) adj off course; twisted to one side •The hunter's bullet went awry. Instead of hitting the bear, it hit his truck. •When we couldn't find a restaurant, our dinner plans went awry.

abash

ABASH (uh BASH) v to make ashamed; to embarrass • Meredith felt abashed by her inability to remember her lines in the school chorus of "Old McDonald Had a Farm." To do something without shame or embarrassment is to do it unabash ed ly. • Ken handed in a term paper that he had unabashedly copied from the National Enquirer.

abysmal

ABYSMAL (uh BIZ mul) adj extremely hopeless or wretched; bottomless An abyss (uh BIS) is a bottomless pit, or something so deep that it seems bot tom less. Abysmal despair is despair so deep that no hope seems possible. • The nation's debt crisis was abysmal; there seemed to be no possible solution. Abysmal is often used somewhat sloppily to mean very bad. You might hear a losing baseball team's performance referred to as abysmal. This isn't strictly correct, but many people do it. WRETCHED = (of a person) in a very unhappy or unfortunate state; of poor quality; very bad; used to express anger or annoyance.

acerbic

ACERBIC (uh SUR bik) adj sour; severe; like acid in temper, mood, or tone • Barry sat silently as our teacher read aloud her acerbic comments on his paper. Acerb and acerbic are synonyms. Acerbity is the state of being acerbic.

ACRIMONIOUS

ACRIMONIOUS (ak ruh MOH nee us) adj full of spite; bitter; nasty •George and Elizabeth's discussion turned acrimonious when Elizabeth introduced the subject of George's perennial, incorrigible stupidity. •Relations between the competing candidates were so acrimonious that each refused to acknowledge the presence of the other.

ACUMEN

ACUMEN (AK yoo mun) n keenness of judgment; mental sharpness • A woman who knows how to turn one dollar into a million over night might be said to have a lot of business acumen. • Ernie's lack of acumen led him to invest all his money in a company that had already gone out of business. Keenness = the quality of being eager or enthusiastic; eagerness.

ACUTE

ACUTE (uh KYOOT) adj sharp; shrewd If your eyesight is acute, you can see things that other people can't. You have visual acuity (uh KYOO uh tee). An acute mind is a quick, intelligent one. You have mental acuity. An acute pain is a sharp pain. Acute means sharp only in a figurative sense. A knife, which is sharp enough to cut, is never said to be acute. Acute is a word doctors throw around quite a bit. An acute dis ease is one that reaches its greatest intensity very quickly and then goes away. What could a disease be if it isn't acute? See chronic.

ADAMANT

ADAMANT (AD uh munt) adj stubborn; unyielding; completely inflexible • Candice was adamant: She would never go out with Paul again. A very hard substance, like a diamond, is also adamant. Adamantine (ad uh MAN teen) and adamant are synonyms. Adamancy is being adamant.

ANECDOTE

ANECDOTE (AN ik doht) n a short account of a humorous or re veal ing incident •The old lady kept the motorcycle gang thoroughly amused with an ec dote after anecdote about her cute little dog. •Alvare told an anecdote about the time Sally got her big toe stuck in a bowling ball. •The vice president set the crowd at ease with an anecdote about his child hood desire to become a vice president. To say that the evidence of life on other planets is merely anecdotal is to say that we haven't captured any aliens, but simply heard a lot of stories from people who claimed to have been kidnapped by flying saucers.

ANGUISH

ANGUISH (ANG gwish) n agonizing physical or mental pain • Theresa had been a nurse in the emergency room for twenty years, but she had never gotten used to the anguish of accident victims.

APHORISM

APHORISM (AF uh riz um) n a brief, often witty saying; a proverb •Benjamin Franklin was fond of aphorisms. He was frequently aph o ris tic. •Chef Hussain is particularly fond of Woolf's aphorism, "One cannot think well, love well, or sleep well, if one has not dined well."

APOCRYPHAL

APOCRYPHAL (uh POK ruh ful) n of dubious authenticity; fictitious; spurious • Brandi's blog discredited the apocryphal report of Martians in Congress. An apocryphal story is one whose truth is not proven or whose false hood is strongly suspected. Like apocalypse, this word has a re li gious origin. The Apocrypha are a number of "extra" books of the Old Testament that Prot es tants and Jews don't include in their Bibles because they don't think they're authentic.

APOTHEOSIS

APOTHEOSIS (uh pahth ee OH sis) n elevation to divine status; the per fect ex am ple of some thing •Some people think that the Corvette is the apotheosis of Ameri can car mak ing. They think it's the ideal. •Geoffrey is unbearable to be with. He thinks he's the apo the o sis of mas cu lin i ty.

APPRECIATE

APPRECIATE (uh PREE shee ayt) v to increase in value •The Browns bought their house twenty years ago for a hun dred dol lars, but it has appreciated considerably since then; today it's worth almost a mil lion dollars. •Harry bought Joe's collection of old chewing-tobacco tins as an in vest ment. His hope was that the tins would appreciate over the next few years, enabling him to turn a profit by selling them to someone else. The opposite of ap pre ci ate is depreciate. When a car loses value over time, we say it has depreciated.

APPROPRIATE

APPROPRIATE (uh PROH pree ayt) v to take without per mis sion; to set aside for a par tic u lar use •Nick appropriated my lunch; he grabbed it out of my hands and ate it. So I appropriated Ed's. •The deer and raccoons appropriated the vegetables in our garden last summer. This year we'll build a better fence. Don't confuse the pronunciation of the verb to appropriate with the pro nun ci a tion of the adjective appropriate (uh PROH pree it). When Con gress decides to buy some new submarines, it appro pri ates mon ey for them. That is, it sets some money aside. The money thus set aside is called an appropriation. When an elected official takes money that was supposed to be spent on submarines and spends it on a Rolls-Royce and a few mink coats, he is said to have mis ap pro pri at ed the money. When the government decides to build a highway through your back yard, it expropriates your property for this purpose. That is, it uses its official authority to take possession of your property.

ARTFUL

ARTFUL (AHRT ful) adj crafty; wily; sly • After dinner, the artful counselor told the campers that there was a mad man loose in the woods, thus causing them to lie quietly in the tent. The Artful Dodger is a sly con man in Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist. Someone who is artless, on the other hand, is simple and hon est. Young children are charmingly artless. SLY = BEING CUNNING. -> CUNNING = having or showing skill in achieving one's ends by deceit or evasion. ARTIFICE = CUNNING

ASCENDANCY

ASCENDANCY (uh SEN dun see) n supremacy; domination •Small computers have been in ascendancy for the past few years. •The ascendancy of the new regime had been a great boon for the econ o my of the tiny tropical kingdom. When something is in ascendancy, it is ascendant.

ASCETIC

ASCETIC (uh SET ik) adj hermitlike; practicing self-denial • The college professor's apartment, which contained no furni ture ex cept a single tattered mattress, was uncomfortably as cet ic. • In his effort to save money, Roy led an ascetic existence: He never went out, he never ate anything but soup, and he never had any fun. Ascetic can also be a noun. A person who leads an ascetic existence is an ascetic. An ascetic is someone who practices asceticism. A similar-sounding word with a very different meaning is aesthetic (es THET ik). Don't be confused.

ATTRITION

ATTRITION (uh TRISH un) n gradual wearing away, weakening, or loss; a natural or expected decrease in numbers or size • Mr. Gregory did not have the heart to fire his workers even though his com pa ny was losing millions each year. He al tru is ti cal ly preferred to lose workers through attrition when they moved away, retired, or de cid ed to change jobs

AUTOCRATIC

AUTOCRATIC (aw tuh KRAT ik) adj ruling with absolute authority; extreme ly bossy •The ruthless dictator's autocratic reign ended when the rebels blew up his palace with plastic ex plo sive. •A two-year-old can be very autocratic—he wants what he wants when he wants it. •No one at our office liked the autocratic manager. He always in sist ed on having his own way, and he never let anyone make a decision without consulting him. An autocrat is an absolute ruler. Autocracy (aw TAHK ruh see), a system of gov ern ment headed by an autocrat, is not democratic—the people don't get a say.

AVARICE

AVARICE (AV ur is) n greed; excessive love of riches • The rich man's avarice was annoying to everyone who wanted to lay hands on some of his money. Avarice is the opposite of gen eros i ty or philanthropy. To be avaricious is to love wealth above all else and not to share it with other people.

AWOW

AVOW (uh VOW) v to claim; to declare boldly; to admit • At the age of twenty-five, Louis finally avowed that he couldn't stand his mother's apple pie. To avow something is to declare or admit some thing that most peo ple are reluctant to declare or admit. • Mr. Smith avowed on tele vi sion that he had never paid any income tax. Shortly after this avowal, he received a lengthy letter from the Internal Revenue Ser vice. An avowed criminal is one who admits he is a criminal. To disavow is to deny or repudiate someone else's claim. • The mayor disavowed the al le ga tion that he had embezzled cam paign con tri bu tions.

amiable

Amiable means friendly. It's very similar to amicable (refers to relationships betwenn people) diffusing warmth and friendliness AMIABLE (AY mee uh bul) adj friendly; agreeable •Our amiable guide made us feel right at home in what would oth er wise have been a cold and forbidding museum. •The drama critic was so amiable in person that even the sub jects of neg a tive reviews found it impossible not to like her. Amicable is a similar and related word. Two not very amiable peo ple might nonetheless make an amicable agreement. Am i ca ble means polite ly friend ly, or not hostile. Two countries might trade amicably with each other even while technically remaining en e mies. • Julio and Clarissa had a sur pris ing ly amicable divorce and remained good friends even after pay ing their lawyers' fees.

BEQUEST

BEQUEST (bih KWEST) n something left to someone in a will If your next-door neighbor leaves you all his millions in a will, the money is a bequest from him to you. It is not polite to request a bequest. Just keep smiling and hope for the best. To leave something to someone in a will is to bequeath it. A bequest is something that has been bequeathed.

bereaved

BEREAVED (buh REEVD) adj deprived or left desolate, es pe cial ly through death •The new widow was still bereaved when we saw her. Every time any one mentioned her dead husband's name, she burst into tears. •The children were bereaved by the death of their pet. Then they got a new pet. Bereft (buh REFT) means the same thing as bereaved.

BESET

BESET (bih SET) v to harass; to surround •The bereaved widow was beset by grief. •Problems beset the expedition almost from the beginning, and the moun tain climbers soon returned to their base camp. •The little town was beset by robberies, but the police could do nothing.

BLATANT

BLATANT (BLAYT unt) adj unpleasantly or offensively noisy; glaring • David was blatantly critical of our efforts; that is, he was noisy and obnoxious in making his criticisms. Blatant is often confused with flagrant, since both words mean glaring. Blatant indicates that something was not concealed very well, whereas flagrant indicates that something was intentional. A blatant act is usually also a flagrant one, but a flagrant act isn't necessarily blatant. You might want to refer to the listing for flagrant.

BLIGHT

BLIGHT (blyte) n a disease in plants; anything that injures or destroys • An early frost proved a blight to the citrus crops last year, so we had no orange juice for breakfast.

BLITHE

BLITHE (blythe) adj carefree; cheerful •The blithe birds in the garden were making so much noise that Jamilla began to think about the shotgun in the attic. • The children were playing blithely in the hazardous-waste dump. While they played, they were blithely unaware that they were doing some thing dangerous. To be blithely ignorant is to be happily unaware.

BOURGEOIS

BOURGEOIS (boor ZHWAH) adj middle class, usually in a pejorative sense; boringly conventional The original bourgeoisie (boor zhwaw ZEE) were simply people who lived in cities, an innovation at the time. They weren't farmers and they weren't nobles. They were members of a new class—the middle class. Now the word is used mostly in making fun of or sneering at people who seem to think about nothing but their possessions and other comforts and about con forming with other people who share those concerns. A hip young city dweller might reject life in the suburbs as being too bourgeois. A person whose dream is to have a swimming pool in his back yard might be called bourgeois by someone who thinks there are more important things in life. Golf is often referred to as a bourgeois sport.

BUCOLIC

BUCOLIC (byoo KAHL ik) adj charmingly rural; rustic; countrylike •The changing of the autumn leaves, old stone walls, distant views, and horses grazing in green meadows are examples of bucolic splendor. •The bucolic scene didn't do much for the city child, who preferred scream ing fire engines and honking horns to the sounds of a babbling brook.

beleaguer

BELEAGUER (bih LEE gur) v to surround; to besiege; to ha rass •No one could leave the beleaguered city; the attacking army had closed off all the exits. •Oscar felt beleaguered at work. He was months behind in his as sign ments, and he had little hope of catching up. •The beleaguered president seldom emerged from the Oval Office as he struggled to deal with the growing scandal.

BELITTLE

BELITTLE (bih LIT ul) v to make to seem little; to put some one down •We worked hard to put out the fire, but the fire chief belittled our efforts by saying he wished he had brought some marshmal lows. •The chairman's belittling comments made everyone feel small.

BEMUSED

BEMUSED (bih MYOOZD) adj confused; bewildered •The two stood bemused in the middle of the parking lot at Disneyland, trying to remember where they had parked their car. •Ralph was bemused when all lights and appliances in his house began switching on and off for no apparent reason. To muse is to think about or ponder things. To be bemused, then, is to have been thinking about things to the point of confusion. People often use the word bemused when they really mean amused, but bemusement is no laughing matter. Bemused means confused.

BURLESQUE

BURLESQUE (bur LESK) n a ludicrous, mocking, lewd imitation • Vaudeville actors frequently performed burlesque works on the stage. Burlesque, parody, lampoon, and caricature share similar meanings.

BANAL

BANAL (buh NAL) adj unoriginal; ordinary • The dinner conversation was so banal that Amanda fell asleep in her dessert dish. A banal statement is a boring, trite, and uncreative statement. It is a ba nal i ty. • What made Yu fall asleep was the banality of the dinner con ver sa tion.

BANE

BANE (bayn) n poison; torment; cause of harm Bane means poison (wolfbane is a kind of poisonous plant), but the word is usually used figuratively. To say that someone is the bane of your existence is to say that that person poisons your enjoyment of life. Baneful means harmful.

BEGET

BEGET (bih GET) v to give birth to; to create; to lead to; to cause • Those who lie should be creative and have good memories, since one lie often begets another lie, which begets another.

CHAGRIN

CHAGRIN (shuh GRIN) n humiliation; embarrassed disappointment •Much to my chagrin, I began to giggle during the eulogy at the funeral. •Doug was filled with chagrin when he lost the race be cause he had put his shoes on the wrong feet. The word chagrin is sometimes used incorrectly to mean surprise. There is, however, a definite note of shame in chagrin. To be chagrined is to feel humiliated or mortified.

CHASTISE

CHASTISE (chas TYZE) v to inflict punishment on; to discipline •Mother chastised us for firing our bottle rockets through the living-room window. •Chastising the dog for sleeping in the fireplace never seemed to do any good; the minute we turned our backs, he'd curl up in the ashes again.

CHICANERY

CHICANERY (shi KAY nuh ree) n trickery; deceitfulness; artifice, especially legal or political • Political news would be dull were it not for the chicanery of our elected officials.

CHIMERA

CHIMERA (kye MEER uh) n an illusion; a foolish fancy •Jie's dream of becoming a movie star was just a chimera. •Could you take a picture of a chimera with a camera? No, of course not. It wouldn't show up on the film.

CHOLERIC

CHOLERIC (KAHL ur ik) adj hot-tempered; quick to anger •The choleric watchdog would sink his teeth into anyone who came with in biting distance of his doghouse. •When the grumpy old man was in one of his choleric moods, the children refused to go near him. •The choleric administra tor kept all the secretaries in a state of terror.

CHRONICLE

CHRONICLE (KRAHN uh kul) n a record of events in order of time; a history • Sally's diary provided her mother with a detailed chronicle of her daughter's extracurricular activities. Chronicle can also be used as a verb. • The reporter chronicled all the events of the revolution. Chronology and chronicle are nearly synonyms: Both provide a chronological list of events. Chronological means in order of time.

CLIQUE

CLIQUE (kleek) n an exclusive group bound together by some shared quality or interest • The high school newspaper staff was a real clique; they all hung out together and wouldn't talk to anyone else. It was hard to have fun at that school if you weren't a member of the right clique. The cheerleaders were cliquish as well.

CATEGORICAL

CATEGORICAL (kat uh GOR uh kul) adj unconditional; absolute A categorical denial is one without exceptions—it covers every category. •Crooked politicians often make categorical denials of various charges against them. Then they go to jail. •I categorically refuse to do anything whatsoever at any time, in any place, with anyone.

CATHARSIS

CATHARSIS (kuh THAR sis) n purification that brings emotional relief or renewal To someone with psychological problems, talking to a psychiatrist can lead to a catharsis. A catharsis is a sometimes traumatic event after which one feels better. A catharsis is cathartic. Some people find emotional movies cathartic—watching one often allows them to release buried feelings. Cathartic can also be a noun.

CADENCE

CADENCE (KAYD uns) n rhythm; the rise and fall of sounds • We wished the tone of Irwin's words would have a more pleasing cadence, but he spoke in a dull monotone.

CAJOLE

CAJOLE (kuh JOHL) v to persuade someone to do something he or she doesn't want to do • I didn't want to give the speech, but Enrique cajoled me into doing it by telling me what a good speaker I am. As it turned out, he simply hadn't been able to find anyone else.

CALLOW

CALLOW (KAL oh) adj immature • The patient was alarmed by the callowness of the medical staff. The doctors looked too young to have graduated from high school, much less from medical school. To be callow is to be youthfully naive, inexperienced, and unsophisticated.

CAPITULATE

CAPITULATE (kuh PICH uh layt) v to surrender; to give up or give in •On the twentieth day of the strike, the workers capitulated and went back to work without a new contract. •So few students paid attention to Mr. Hernandez that he had to re ca pit u late his major points at the end of the class. To recapitulate is not to capitulate again. To reca pit u late is to summarize.

COLLUSION

COLLUSION (kuh LOO zhun) n conspiracy; secret cooperation •The increase in oil prices was the result of collusion by the oil-producing nations. •There was collusion among the owners of the baseball teams; they agreed secretly not to sign any expensive free agents. If the baseball owners were in collusion, then you could say that they had colluded. To collude is to conspire.

COMPELLING

COMPELLING (kum PEL ing) adj forceful; causing to yield •A compelling argument for buying a digital video recorder is one that makes you go out and buy a digital video recorder. •The recruiter's speech was so compelling that nearly everyone in the auditorium enlisted in the Army when it was over. To compel someone to do something is to force him or her to do it. • Our consciences compelled us to turn over the money we had found to the authorities. The noun is compulsion, which also means an irresistible impulse to do something irrational.

COMPLACENT

COMPLACENT (kum PLAY sunt) adj self-satisfied; overly pleased with one self; contented to a fault •The complacent camper paid no attention to the bear prowling around his campsite, and the bear ate him up. •The football team won so many games that it became complacent, and the worst team in the league snuck up and beat it. To fall into complacency is to become comfortably uncaring about the world around you. • The president of the student council was appalled by the complacency of his classmates; not one of the seniors seemed to care whether the theme of the prom was "You Light up My Life" or "Color My World." Don't confuse complacent with complaisant (kum PLAY zunt), which means eager to please.

COMPLICITY

COMPLICITY (kum PLIS uh tee) n participation in wrongdoing; the act of being an accomplice •There was complicity between the bank robber and the dishon est teller. The teller neglected to turn on the alarm, and the robber reward ed him by sharing the loot. •Complicity among the students made it impossible to find out which of them had pulled the fire alarm.

COMPRISE

COMPRISE (kum PRYZE) v to consist of •A football team comprises eleven players on offense and eleven players on defense. •A company comprises employees. This word is often misused. Be careful. Players do not "comprise" a foot ball team, and employees do not "comprise" a company. Nor can a football team be said to be "comprised of" players, or a company to be "comprised of" employees. These are common mistakes. Instead, you can say that players constitute or compose a team, and that employees constitute or compose a company. You can also say that a team consists of players or a company consists of employees.

CONCORD

CONCORD (KAHN kord) n harmony; agreement Nations that live in concord are nations that live together in peace. • The war between the neighboring tribes ended thirty years of con cord. • The faculty meeting was marked by concord; no one yelled at anyone else. Discord is the opposite of concord. A faculty meeting where every one yelled at one another would be a faculty meeting marked by discord. It would be a discordant meeting. An accord is a formal agreement, usually reached after a dispute.

CONDESCEND

CONDESCEND (KAHN duh send) v to stoop to someone else's level, usually in an offensive way; to patronize • I was surprised that the president of the company had condescended to talk with me, a mere temporary employee. Many grown-ups make the mistake of condescending to young chil dren, who usually prefer to be treated as equals, or at least as ra tio nal beings.

CONDUCIVE

CONDUCIVE (kun DOO siv) adj promoting •The chairs in the library are conducive to sleep. If you sit in them to study, you will fall asleep. •The foul weather was not conducive to our having a picnic.

CONFLUENCE

CONFLUENCE (KAHN floo uns) n a flowing together, especially of rivers; the place where they begin to flow together •The confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi rivers is at St. Louis; that's the place where they join together. •There is a remarkable confluence in our thoughts: We think the same way about almost everything. •A confluence of many factors (no ice, bad food, terrible music) made it inevitable that the party would be a flop.

CONGENIAL

CONGENIAL (kun JEEN yul) adj agreeably suitable; pleasant •The little cabin in the woods was congenial to the writer; he was able to get a lot of writing done there. •The new restaurant has a congenial atmosphere. We enjoy just sitting there playing with the ice in our water glasses. When people get along together at a restaurant, and don't throw food at one another, they are being congenial. Genial and congenial share similar meanings. Genial means pleasing, kind, sympathetic, or helpful. You can be pleased by a genial manner or by a genial climate.

CONGENITAL

CONGENITAL (kun JEN uh tul) adj describing a trait or condition acquired be tween conception and birth; innate A congenital birth defect is one that is present at birth but was not caused by one's genes. The word is also used more loosely to describe any (usually bad) trait or behavior that is so firmly fixed it seems to be a part of a person's nature. A congenital liar is a natural liar, a person who can't help but lie.

CONJECTURE

CONJECTURE (kun JEK chur) v to guess; to deduce or infer on slight evidence • If forced to conjecture, I would say the volcano will erupt in twenty-four hours. Conjecture can also be a noun. • The divorce lawyer for Mr. Davis argued that the putative cause of the lipstick on his collar was mere conjecture. A conjecture is conjectural. DEDUCE (di DOOS) = v to conclude from the evidence; to infer. To deduce something is to conclude it without being told it directly. •From the footprints on the ground, Clarice deduced that the crim i nal had feet. •Daffy deduced from the shape of its bill that the duck was really a chicken. That the duck was really a chicken was Daffy's deduction.

CONJURE

CONJURE (KAHN jur) v to summon or bring into being as if by magic •The chef conjured (or conjured up) a fabulous gourmet meal using nothing more than the meager ingredients in Lucy's kitchen. •The wizard conjured (or conjured up) an evil spirit by mum bling some magic words and throwing a little powdered eye of newt into the fire.

CONNOISSEUR

CONNOISSEUR (kahn uh SUR) n an expert, particularly in matters of art or taste •The artist's work was popular, but connoisseurs rejected it as amateurish. •Frank was a connoisseur of bad movies. He had seen them all and knew which ones were genuinely dreadful and which ones were merely poorly made. •The meal was exquisite enough to impress a connoisseur. •I like sculp ture, but I'm no connoisseur; I couldn't tell you why one statue is better than another.

CONSECRATE

CONSECRATE (KAHN suh krayt) v to make or declare sacred •The Veterans Day speaker said that the battlefield had been consecrated by the blood of the soldiers who had died there. •The priest consecrated the building by sprinkling holy water on it. •The col lege chaplain delivered a sermon at the consecration (kahn suh KRAY shun) ceremony for the new chapel. The opposite of consecrate is desecrate (DES uh krayt), which means to treat ir rev er ent ly. The vandals desecrated the cemetery by knocking down all the tomb stones. Desecrate can also be applied to areas outside religion. •Their act of vandalism was a desecration. •Doodling in a book desecrates the book, even if the book isn't a Bible. •The graffiti on the front door of the school is a desecration.

CONSONANT

CONSONANT (KAHN suh nunt) adj harmonious; in agreement •Our desires were consonant with theirs; we all wanted the same thing. •The decision to construct a new gymnasium was consonant with the superintendent's belief in physical education. The opposite of consonant is dissonant (DIS uh nunt), which means inharmonious. Dissonant voices are voices that don't sound good together.

CONSUMMATE

CONSUMMATE (kun SUM it) adj perfect; complete; supremely skillful • A consummate pianist is an extremely good one. Nothing is lacking in the way he or she plays. Consummate (KAHN suh mayt) is also a verb. Notice the different pronunciation. To consummate something is to finish it or make it complete. Signing a contract would consummate an agreement. Note carefully the pronunciation of both parts of speech.

CONTIGENT

CONTINGENT (kun TIN junt) adj dependent; possible •Our agreement to buy their house is contingent upon the sellers' find ing another house to move into. That is, they won't sell their house to us unless they can find another house to buy. •My hap pi ness is contingent on yours; if you're unhappy, I'm unhappy. •The Bowdens were prepared for any contingency. Their front hall closet con tained a first-aid kit, a fire extinguisher, a life raft, a para chute, and a pack of sled dogs. A contingency is a possibility or something that may happen but is at least as likely not to happen. • Several contingencies stand be tween us and the successful completion of our business proposal; several things could happen to screw it up.

COROLLARY

COROLLARY (KOR uh ler ee) n something that follows; a natural consequence In mathematics, a corollary is a law that can be deduced with out further proof from a law that has already been proven. •Bloodshed and death are corollaries of any declaration of war. •Higher prices were a corollary of the two companies' agreement not to compete.

COUNTENANCE

COUNTENANCE (KOWN tuh nuns) n face; facial expression, especially an encouraging one •His father's confident countenance gave Lou the courage to persevere. •Ed's harsh words belied his countenance, which was kind and encouraging. Countenance can also be a verb. To countenance something is to condone it or tolerate it. • Dad countenanced our backyard rock fights even though he didn't really approve of them.

COVENANT

COVENANT (KUV uh nunt) n a solemn agreement; a contract; a pledge •The warring tribes made a covenant not to fight each other anymore. •We signed a covenant never to drive Masha's father's car without permission again.

CURTAIL

CURTAIL (kur TAYL) v to shorten; to cut short • The vet curtailed his effort to cut the cat's tail with the lawn mow er. That is, he stopped trying. To curtail a tale is to cut it short.

DESTITUTE

DESTITUTE (DES tuh toot) adj extremely poor; utterly lacking Destitute people are people without money or possessions, or with very little money and very few possessions. To be left destitute is to be left without money or property. The word can also be used figuratively. A teacher might accuse her students of being destitute of brains, or intellectually des ti tute.

DESULTORY

DESULTORY (DES ul tor ee) adj without a plan or purpose; dis con nect ed; ran dom •Aadi made a few desultory attempts to start a garden, but nothing came of them. •In his desultory address, Rizal skipped from one topic to an oth er and never came to the point. •The discussion at our meeting was desultory; no one's comments seemed to bear any relation to anyone else's.

DEXTROUS

DEXTROUS (DEX trus) adj skillful; adroit Dextrous often, but not always, connotes physical ability. Like adroit, it comes from the Latin word for right (as in the direction), because right-handed people were once considered physically and mentally superior. •Though not imposing in stature, Rashid was the most dextrous basketball player on the court; he often beat taller competitors with his nimble management of the ball. •Ilya was determined not to sell the restaurant on eBay; even the most dextrous negotiator could not sway him. You may also see this word spelled dexterous. Dexterity is the noun form. For an antonym, see gauche.

DIFFIDENT

DIFFIDENT (DIF i dunt) adj timid; lacking in self-confidence Diffident and confident are opposites. •The diffident student never made a single comment in class. •Sebastian's stammer made him diffident in conversation and shy in groups of strangers. •Carla's diffidence led many participants to believe she hadn't been present at the meeting, even though she had.

DEPRECATE

DEPRECATE (DEP ruh kayt) v to express disapproval of • To deprecate a colleague's work is to risk making yourself unwelcome in your colleague's office. "This stinks!" is a deprecating remark. •The critic's deprecating comments about my new novel put me in a bad mood for an entire month. •To be self-deprecating is to make little of one's own efforts, often in the hope that some one else will say, "No, you're swell!"

DEROGATORY

DEROGATORY (dih RAHG uh tor ee) adj disapproving; de grading Derogatory remarks are negative remarks expressing disapproval. They are nastier than merely critical remarks. • Stephen could never seem to think of anything nice to say about any one; virtually all of his comments were derogatory.

DESPONDENT

DESPONDENT (dih SPAHN dunt) adj extremely depressed; full of despair •The cook became despondent when the wedding cake ex plod ed fifteen minutes before the reception. •After the death of his wife, the man was despondent for many months. •The team fell into despondency after losing the state cham pi on ship by a single point.

DECOROUS

DECOROUS (DEK ur us) adj proper; in good taste; orderly Decorous behavior is good, polite, orderly behavior. To be decorous is to be sober and tasteful. • The New Year's Eve crowd was relatively decorous until midnight, when they went wild. To behave decorously is to behave with decorum (di KOR um).

DEGENERATE (deteriorate)

DEGENERATE (di JEN uh rayt) v to break down; to deteriorate •The discussion quickly degenerated into an argument. •Over the years, the nice old neighborhood had degenerated into a ter ri ble slum. •The fans' behavior degenerated as the game went on. A person whose behavior has degenerated can be referred to as a de gen er ate (di JEN ur it). • The mood of the party was spoiled when a drunken de gen er ate wan dered in from off the street. Degenerate (di JEN ur it) can also be an adjective, meaning degenerated. •The slum neighborhood was degenerate. •The fans' de gen er ate be hav ior prompted the police to make sev er al ar rests.

DELUDE

DELUDE (dye LOOD) v to deceive •The con man deluded us into thinking that he would make us rich. Instead, he tricked us into giving him several hundred dollars. •The deluded mental patient believed that he was a chicken sand wich. •Lori is so persuasive that she was able to delude Leslie into thinking she was a countess.

DEMAGOGUE

DEMAGOGUE (DEM uh gawg) n a leader of the people, but more a rabble rouser A demagogue is a leader, but not in a good sense of the word. He manipulates the public to support his aims, but he is little different from a dictator. A demagogue is often a despot. This word can also be spelled demagog. The methods a demagogue uses are demagoguery (DEM uh gahg uh ree) or demagogy (DEM uh gahg ee). DESPOT = DESPOT (DES puht) n an absolute ruler; an autocrat •Stephen was a despot; workers who disagreed with him were fired. •The island kingdom was ruled by a ruthless despot who ex e cut ed sus pect ed rebels at noon each day in the village square. To act like a despot is to be despotic (di SPAH tik). • There was cheering in the street when the country's despotic gov ern ment was overthrown.

DENIZEN

DENIZEN (DEN i zun) n inhabitant To be a denizen of a country is to live there. A citizen of a country is usually also a denizen. To be a denizen of a restaurant is to go there often—so often that people begin to wonder whether you live there. Fish are sometimes referred to as "denizens of the deep." Don't refer to them this way yourself; the expression is a cliché.

DEPRAVITY

DEPRAVITY (di PRAV uh tee) n extreme wickedness or corruption • Mrs. Prudinkle wondered whether the depravity of her class of eight-year-olds was the result of their watching Saturday morning television. To exhibit depravity is to be depraved (di PRAYVD).

DILETTANTE

DILETTANTE (DIL uh tahnt) n someone with superficial knowledge of the arts; an amateur; a dabbler To be a dilettante is to dabble in something rather than doing it in a serious way. •Reginald said he was an artist, but he was merely a dilettante; he didn't know a pencil from a paintbrush. •Antonella dis missed the members of the ladies' sculpture club as nothing more than a bunch of dilettantes.

DISCERN

DISCERN (dih SURN) v to have insight; to see things clearly; to discriminate; to differentiate To discern something is to perceive it clearly. A writer whose work demonstrates discernment is a writer who is a keen observer. • The ill-mannered people at Tisha's party proved that she had little discernment when it came to choosing friends. - DISCRIMINATE = to notice or point out the difference be tween two or more things; to discern; to differentiate A person with a refined aesthetic sense is able to discriminate subtle differences where a less observant person would see nothing. Such a per son is discriminating. This kind of discrimination is a good thing. To discriminate unfairly, though, is to dwell on differences that shouldn't make a difference. It is unfair—and illegal—to discriminate between black people and white people in selling a house. Such a practice is not discriminating (which is good), but discriminatory (which is wrong). Indiscriminate means not discriminating; in other words, random or haphazard.

discrete

DISCRETE (dih SKREET) adj unconnected; separate; distinct Do not confuse discrete with discreet. •The twins were identical but their personalities were discrete. •The drop in the stock market was not the result of any single force but of many discrete trends. When things are all jumbled up together, they are said to be in dis crete, which means not separated or sorted.

disparage

DISPARAGE (dih SPAR ij) v to belittle; to say uncomplimentary things about, usually in a somewhat indirect way •The mayor disparaged our efforts to beautify the town square by saying that the flower bed we had planted looked some what worse than the bed of weeds it had replaced. •My guidance counselor disparaged my high school record by telling me that not everybody belongs in college.

DISTEND

DISTEND (di STEND) v to swell; to extend a great deal •The tire distended alarmingly as the forgetful gas station at-ten dant kept pumping more and more air into it. •A distended belly is one symptom of malnutrition. A swelling is a distension.

DISTINGUISH

DISTINGUISH (di STING gwish) v to tell apart; to cause to stand out •The rodent expert's eyesight was so acute that he was able to dis tin guish between a shrew and a vole at more than a thou sand paces. •I studied and studied but I was never able to distinguish between discrete and discreet. •His face had no distinguishing characteristics; there was noth ing about his features that stuck in your memory. •Lou's uneventful career as a dogcatcher was not distinguished by ad ven ture or excitement.

DOCTRINAIRE

DOCTRINAIRE (dahk truh NAYR) adj inflexibly committed to a doc trine or theory with out regard to its practicality; dog mat ic A doctrinaire supporter of manned space flights to Pluto would be some one who supported such space flights even though it might be shown that such lengthy journeys could never be undertaken. A doctrinaire opponent of fluoridation of water would be someone whose opposition could not be shaken by proof that fluoride is good for teeth and not bad for anything else. A person with doc tri naire views can be called a doctrinaire.

DOGMATIC

DOGMATIC (dawg MAT ik) adj arrogantly assertive of unproven ideas; stubbornly claiming that something (often a system of beliefs) is beyond dispute A dogma is a belief. A dogmatic person, however, is stubbornly convinced of his beliefs. •Marty is dogmatic on the subject of the creation of the world; he sneers at anyone whose views are not identical to his. •The philosophy professor became increasingly dogmatic as he grew older and became more firmly convinced of his strange theories. The opinions or ideas dogmatically asserted by a dogmatic person are known collectively as dogma.

EBULLIENT

EBULLIENT (ih BUL yunt) adj boiling; bubbling with excitement; exuberant A boiling liquid can be called ebullient. More often, though, this word describes excited or enthusiastic people. The roaring crowd in a full stadium before the World Series might be said to be ebullient. A person overflowing with enthusiasm might be said to be ebullient. • Cammie was ebullient when her fairy godmother said she could use one of her three wishes to wish for three more wishes. Someone or something that is ebullient is characterized by ebullience. Note carefully the pronunciation of this word.

EDIFY

EDIFY (ED uh fye) v to enlighten; to instruct, especially in moral or religious matters •We found the pastor's sermon on the importance of not eating beans to be most edifying. •The teacher's goal was to edify her students, not to force a handful of facts down their throats. •We would have felt lost at the art show had not the ex cel lent and in for ma tive programs been provided for our edification.

EFFACE

EFFACE (ih FAYS) v to erase; to rub away the features of •The inscription on the tombstone had been effaced by centuries of weather. •The vandals effaced the delicate carving by rubbing it with sand pa per. •We tried to efface the dirty words that had been written on the front of our house, but nothing would remove them. To be self-effacing is to be modest. • John is self-effacing: He won an Olympic gold medal and all he said was, "Aw, shucks. I'm just a regular fella."

EFFUSION

EFFUSION (ih FYOO zhun) n a pouring forth •When the child was rescued from the well, there was an in tense ef fu sion of emotion from the crowd that had gathered around the hole. •The madman's writings consisted of a steady effusion of nonsense. To be effusive is to be highly emotional. • Anna's effusive thanks for our silly little present made us feel some what em bar rassed, so we decided to move to a different city.

EGREGIOUS

EGREGIOUS (ih GREE jus) adj extremely bad; flagrant Save this word for things that are worse than bad. •The mother's egregious neglect was responsible for her child's ac ci den tal cross-country ride on the freight train. •Erik's manners were egre gious; he ate his mashed potatoes with his fingers and slurped the peas right off his plate.

ELICIT

ELICIT (ih LIS it) v to bring out; to call forth •The interviewer skillfully elicited our true feelings by asking us ques tions that got to the heart of the matter. •The defendant tried to elicit the sympathy of the jury by appear ing at the trial in a wheel chair, but the jury convicted him anyway. Don't confuse this word with illicit.

ELLIPTICAL

ELLIPTICAL (ih LIP ti kul) adj oval; missing a word or words; obscure • The orbit of the earth is not perfectly round; it is elliptical. An egg may have an elliptical shape. An elliptical statement is one that is hard or impossible to understand, either because some thing is missing from it or because the speaker or writer is trying to be hard to understand. • The announcement from the State Department was purposely elliptical—the government didn't really want reporters to know what was going on.

ELUSIVE

ELUSIVE (ih LOO siv) adj hard to pin down; evasive To be elusive is to elude, which means to avoid, evade, or escape. •The answer to the problem was elusive; every time the math-e ma ti cian thought he was close, he discovered another error. (Or, one could say that the answer to the problem eluded the math e ma ti cian.) •The elusive criminal was next to impossible for the police to catch. (The criminal eluded the police.) •The team played hard, but victory was elusive and they suffered an oth er defeat. (Victory eluded the hard-playing team.)

EMINENT

EMINENT (EM uh nunt) adj well-known and respected; stand ing out from all others in quality or accomplishment; outstanding •The visiting poet was so eminent that our English teacher fell to the ground before him and licked his shoes. Our English teacher thought the poet was preeminent in his field. •The entire audience fell silent when the eminent musician walked onto the stage and picked up his banjo and bongo drums.

ENCROACH

ENCROACH (en KROHCH) v to make gradual or stealthy inroads into; to trespass •As the city grew, it encroached on the countryside surrounding it. •With an encroaching sense of dread, I slowly pushed open the blood-spattered door. •My neighbor encroached on my yard by building his new stockade fence a few feet on my side of the property line.

ENDEMIC

ENDEMIC (en DEM ik) adj native; restricted to a particular region or era; in dig e nous •You won't find that kind of tree in California; it's endemic to our part of the country. •That peculiar strain of influenza was endemic to a small community in South Carolina; there were no cases anywhere else. •The writer Tom Wolfe coined the term "Me Decade" to de scribe the egocentricity endemic in the 1970s.

ENFRANCHISE

ENFRANCHISE (en FRAN chyze) v to grant the privileges of citizenship, especially the right to vote • In the United States, citizens become enfranchised on their eighteenth birth days. American women were not enfranchised until the adoption of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920, which gave them the right to vote. To disfranchise (or disenfranchise) someone is to take away the privileges of citizenship or take away the right to vote. • One of the goals of the reform candidate was to disfranchise the bodies at the cemetery, which had had a habit of voting for the crooked mayor.

ENORMITY

ENORMITY (i NOR muh tee) n extreme evil; a hideous offense; immensity • Hitler's soldiers stormed through the village, committing one enormity after another. "Hugeness" or "great size" is not the main meaning of enormity. When you want to talk about the gigantic size of something, use im men si ty instead

EPIGRAM

EPIGRAM (EP uh gram) n a brief and usually witty or satirical saying People often find it difficult to remember the difference be tween an epigram and an: epigraph: an apt quotation placed at the beginning of a book or essay epitaph: a commemorative inscription on a grave epithet: a term used to characterize the nature of something; sometimes a disparaging term used to describe a person.

EQUANIMITY

EQUANIMITY (ek wuh NIM uh tee) n composure; calm •The entire apartment building was crumbling, but Rachel faced the disaster with equanimity. She ducked out of the way of a falling beam and made herself a chocolate sundae. •John's mother looked at the broken glass on the floor with equanimity; at least he didn't hurt himself when he knocked over the vase.

EQUITABLE

EQUITABLE (EK wuh tuh bul) adj fair •King Solomon's decision was certainly equitable; each mother would receive half the child. •The pirates distributed the loot equitably among themselves, so that each pirate received the same share as every other pirate. •The divorce settlement was quite equitable. Sheila got the right half of the house and Tom got the left half. Equity is fairness; inequity is unfairness. Iniquity and inequity both mean unfair, but iniquity implies wickedness as well. By the way, equity has a meaning in business.

ESOTERIC

ESOTERIC (es uh TER ik) adj hard to understand; un der stood by only a select few; peculiar •Chicken wrestling and underwater yodeling were just two of Earl's es o ter ic hobbies. •The author's books were so esoteric that not even his mother bought any of them.

espouse

ESPOUSE (eh SPOWZ) v to support; to advocate •The Mormons used to espouse bigamy, or marriage to more than one woman. •Alex espoused so many causes that he sometimes had trouble remembering which side he was on. •The candidate for governor espoused a program in which all taxes would be abolished and all the state's revenues would be supplied by income from bingo and horse racing.

exacerbate

EXACERBATE: to make worse It is unwise to take aspirin to try to relieve heartburn; instead of providing relief, the drug will only EXACERBATE the problem. EXACERBATE (ig ZAS ur bayt) v to make worse •Dipping Austin in lye exacerbated his skin condition. •The widow's grief was exacerbated by the minister's momentary in ability to remember her dead husband's name. •The fender-bender was exacerbated when a line of twenty-five cars plowed into the back of Margaret's car.

EXACTING

EXACTING (ig ZAK ting) adj extremely demanding; difficult; re quir ing great skill or care •The exacting math teacher subtracted points for even the most un im por tant errors. •Weaving cloth out of guinea-pig hair is an exacting oc cu pa tion be cause guinea pigs are small and their hair is short. •The surgeon's exacting task was to reconnect the patient's severed eye lash es.

EXASPERATE

EXASPERATE (ig ZAS puh rayt) v to annoy thoroughly; to make very angry; to try the patience of •The child's insistence on hopping backward on one foot ex as per at ed his mother, who was in a hurry. •The algebra class's refusal to answer any ques tions was extreme ly ex as per at ing to the substitute teacher.

EXHORT

EXHORT (ig ZORT) v to urge strongly; to give a serious warningto •The coach used his bullhorn to exhort us to try harder. •The fearful forest ranger exhorted us not to go into the cave, but we did so anyway and became lost in the center of the earth. The adjective is hortatory (HOR tuh tor ee).

EXIGENCY

EXIGENCY (EK si jen see) n an emergency; an urgency • An academic exigency: You haven't opened a book all term and the final is tomorrow morning. Exigent means urgent.

EXISTENTIAL

EXISTENTIAL (eg zis TEN shul) adj having to do with ex ist ence; hav ing to do with the body of thought called ex is ten tial ism, which ba si cal ly holds that human beings are re spon si ble for their own actions but is otherwise too com pli cat ed to summarize in a single sentence This word is overused but under-understood by virtually all of the people who use it. Unless you have a very good reason for throw ing it around, you should probably avoid it.

EXPATRIATE

EXPATRIATE (eks PAY tree ayt) v to throw (some one) out of his or her native land; to move away from one's native land; to emigrate •The rebels were expatriated by the nervous general, who feared that they would cause trouble if they were allowed to remain in the coun try. •Hugo was fed up with his native country and so ex pa tri at ed to Amer i ca. In doing so, Hugo became an expatriate (eks PAY tree ut). To repatriate (ree PAY tree ayt) is to return to one's native cit i zen ship; that is, to become a repatriate (ree PAY tree it).

EXPEDIENT

EXPEDIENT (ik SPEE dee unt) adj providing an immediate ad van tage; serv ing one's im me di ate self-interest; practical •Since the basement had nearly filled with water, the plumber felt it would be expedient to clear out the drain. •The candidate's position in favor of higher pay for teachers was an ex pe di ent one adopted for the national teachers' con ven tion and aban doned shortly afterward. Expedient can also be used as a noun for something expedient. • The car repair man did not have his tool kit handy, so he used chewing gum as an ex pe di ent to patch a hole. The noun expedience or expediency is practicality or being es pe cial ly suited to a particular goal.

EXPEDITE

EXPEDITE (EK spi dyte) v to speed up or ease the progress of •The post office expedited mail delivery by hiring more letter car ri ers. •The lawyer expedited the progress of our case through the courts by brib ing a few judges. •Our wait for a table was expedited by a waiter who mistook Angela for a movie star.

EXTOL

EXTOL (ik STOHL) v to praise highly; to laud • The millionaire extolled the citizen who returned his gold watch and then rewarded him with a heartfelt handshake.

extraneous

EXTRANEOUS (ik STRAY nee us) adj unnecessary; ir rel e vant; extra •Extra ice cream would never be extraneous, unless ev ery one had al ready eaten so much that no one wanted any more. •The book's feeble plot was buried in a lot of extraneous ma te ri al about a talking dog. •The soup contained several ex tra ne ous in gre di ents, including hair, sand, and a single dead fly. To be extraneous is to be extra and always with the sense of being un nec es sary.

EXTRICATE

EXTRICATE (EK struh kayt) v to free from difficulty •It took two and a half days to extricate the little girl from the abandoned well into which she had fallen. •Yoshi had to pretend to be sick to extricate himself from the blind date with the mud wrestler. •Monica had no trouble driving her car into the ditch, but she needed a tow truck to extricate it. Something that is permanently stuck is inextricable (in EKS tri kuh bul).

EXULT

EXULT (ig ZULT) v to rejoice; to celebrate • The women's team exulted in its victory over the men's team at the bad min ton finals. They were exultant.

FACTION

FACTION (FAK shun) n a group, usually a small part of a larger group, united around some cause; disagreement within an organization •At the Re pub li can National Convention, the Bush faction spent much of its time shouting at the McCain faction. •The faculty was relatively happy, but there was a faction that called for higher pay. •When the controversial topic of the fund drive came up, the com mit tee descended into bitterness and faction. It was a factious topic.

FABRICATION

FABRICATION (FAB ruh kay shun) n a lie; some thing made up •My story about being the prince of Wales was a fabrication. I'm really the king of Denmark. •The suspected murderer's alibi turned out to be an elaborate fabrication; in other words, he was lying when he said that he hadn't killed the victim. To create a fab ri ca tion is to fabricate.

FACETIOUS

FACETIOUS (fuh SEE shus) adj humorous; not se ri ous; clum si ly humor ous •David was sent to the principal's office for making a facetious remark about the intelligence of the French teacher. •Our proposal about shipping our town's garbage to the moon was fa ce tious, but the first selectman took it seriously.

FACILE

FACILE (FAS il) adj fluent; skillful in a su per fi cial way; easy To say that a writer's style is facile is to say both that it is skillful and that it would be better if the writer exerted himself or herself more. The word facile almost always contains this sense of su per fi ci al i ty. •Paolo's poems were facile rather than truly accomplished; if you read them closely, you soon realized they were filled with clichés. •The CEO of the company was a facile speaker. He could speak en gag ing ly on almost any topic with very little preparation. He spoke with great facility.

FARCICAL

FARCICAL (FARS i kul) adj absurd; ludicrous •The serious play quickly turned farcical when the leading man's belt broke and his pants fell to his ankles. •The formerly secret documents detailed the CIA's farcical attempt to discredit Fidel Castro by sprinkling his shoes with a powder that was supposed to make his beard fall out. Farcical means like a farce, which is a mockery or a ridiculous satire.

FASTIDIOUS

FASTIDIOUS (fa STID ee us) adj meticulous; de mand ing; finicky •Mrs. O'Hara was a fastidious housekeeper; she cleaned up our crumbs al most before they hit the floor. •Jeb was so fastidious in his work habits that he needed neither a waste bas ket nor an eraser. •The fastidious secretary was nearly driven mad by her boss, who used the floor as a file cabinet and his desk as a pantry.

FATUOUS

FATUOUS (FACH oo us) adj foolish; silly; idiotic • Pauline is so pretty that her suitors are often driven to fatuous acts of devotion. They are infatuated with her.

FETTER

FETTER (FET ur) v to restrain; to hamper • In his pursuit of the Nobel Prize for physics, Professor Jenkins was fettered by his near-total ignorance of the subject. To be unfettered is to be unrestrained or free of hindrances. • After the dictator was deposed, the novelist produced fiction that was un fet tered by the strict rules of censorship. A fetter is literally a chain (attached to the foot) that is used to restrain a criminal or, for that matter, an innocent person. A fig u ra tive fetter can be anything that hampers or restrains some one. • The house wife's young chil dren were the fetters that pre vent ed her from pursuing a second Master's degree.

FINESSE

FINESSE (fi NES) n skillful maneuvering; sub tle ty; craftiness •The doctor sewed up the wound with finesse, making stitches so small one could scarcely see them. •The boxer moved with such finesse that his opponent never knew what hit him.

FLAGRANT

FLAGRANT (FLAY grunt) adj glaringly bad; notorious; scandalous An example of a flagrant theft would be stealing a car from the parking lot of a police station. A flagrant spelling error is a very noticeable one. See the listing for blatant, as these two words are often confused.

FLAUNT

FLAUNT (flawnt) v to show off; to display os ten ta tious ly •The brand-new millionaire annoyed all his friends by driving around his old neighborhood to flaunt his new Rolls-Royce. •Colleen flaunted her en gage ment ring, shoving it in the face of almost anyone who came near her. This word is very often confused with flout.

FOIBLE

FOIBLE (FOY bul) n a minor character flaw •Patti's foibles included a tendency to prefer dogs to people. •The delegates to the state convention ignored the candidates' po si tions on the major issues and concentrated on their foibles.

FOMENT

FOMENT (foh MENT) v to stir up; to instigate •The bad news from abroad fomented pessimism among pro fes sion al in ves tors. •The radicals spread several rumors in an effort to foment rebel lion among the peas ants.

FORBEAR

FORBEAR (for BAYR) v to refrain from; to abstain •Stephen told me I could become a millionaire if I joined him in his business, but his company makes me nervous so I decided to forbear. •George forbore to punch me in the nose, even though I had told him that I thought he was a sniveling idiot. The noun is forbearance. A forebear (FOR bayr)—sometimes also spelled forbear—is an an ces tor.

FOREGO

FOREGO (for GOH) v to do without; to forbear • We had some of the chocolate cake, some of the chocolate mousse, and some of the chocolate cream pie, but we were worried about our weight so we decided to forego the choc o late-covered potato chips. That is, we forewent them. Can also be spelled forgo.

FORSAKE

FORSAKE (for SAYK) v to abandon; to renounce; to relinquish •We urged Buddy to forsake his life with the alien beings and return to his job at the drugstore. •All the guru's followers had forsaken him, so he became a real estate developer and turned his temple into an apartment build ing.

FORTUITOUS

FORTUITOUS (for TOO uh tus) adj accidental; occurring by chance •The program's outcome was not the result of any plan but was entirely fortuitous. •The object was so perfectly formed that its creation could not have been fortuitous. Fortuitous is often misused to mean lucky or serendipitous. Don't make that same mistake. It means merely accidental.

FOUNDER

FOUNDER (FOWN dur) v to fail; to collapse; to sink •The candidate's campaign for the presidency foundered when it was revealed that he had once been married to a drug ad dict. •Zeke successfully struggled through the first part of the course but foundered when the final examination was given. •The ship foundered shortly after its hull fell off. Be careful not to confuse this word with flounder, which means to move clumsily or in confusion. •Our field hockey team floundered helplessly around the field while the opposing team scored goal after goal.

FRENETIC

FRENETIC (fruh NET ik) adj frantic; frenzied •There was a lot of frenetic activity in the office, but nothing ever seemed to get accomplished. •The bird's frenetic attempt to free itself from the thorn bush finally ex haust ed it. Then the cat strolled over and ate it. FRANTIC = wild or distraught with fear, anxiety, or other emotion. FRENZIED = wildly excited or uncontrolled.

FRUGAL

FRUGAL (FROO gul) adj economical; penny-pinching •Laura was so frugal that she even tried to bargain with the check out girl at the supermarket. •We were as frugal as we could be, but we still ended up several thousand dollars in debt. •Hannah's frugality annoyed her husband, who loved nothing better than spending money.

FUTILE

FUTILE (FYOOT ul) adj useless; hopeless • A D+ average and no extracurricular interests to speak of meant that applying to Harvard was futile, but Lucinda hoped against hope. Something futile is a futility (fyoo TIL uh tee). • Lucinda doesn't know what a futility it is.

GRATUITOUS

GRATUITOUS (gruh TOO uh tus) adj given freely (said of some thing bad); un jus ti fied; unprovoked; uncalled for •The scathing review of the movie contained several gratuitous remarks about the sex life of the director. •Their attack against us was gratuitous; we had never done anything to offend them. Gratuitous is often misunderstood be cause it is con fused with gratu ity. A gratuity is a tip, like the one you leave in a res tau rant. A gratuity is a nice thing. Gra tu itous, however, is not nice. Don't confuse these words.

MERCURIAL

MERCURIAL (mur KYOOR ee ul) adj emotionally un pre dict able; rap id ly chang ing in mood A person with a mercurial personality is one who changes rapidly and unpredictably between one mood and another. • Mercurial Helen was crying one minute, laughing the next.

GARRULOUS

GARRULOUS (GAR uh lus) adj talkative; chatty • Gabriella is gregarious and garrulous; she loves to hang out with the gang and gab.

GAUCHE

GAUCHE (gohsh) adj unskillful; awkward; maladroit Remember dextrous? Well, gauche is pretty much the exact opposite. It is the French word for left—the connection is that left-handed people were once thought to be clumsy (this was clearly before the invention of left-handed scissors) and perverse, even evil. These days, gauche tends to describe social, rather than physical, ineptness. • Smadar had a poor sense of comic timing, and her gauche attempts to mock her left-handed friends soon left her with none.

GENTEEL

GENTEEL (jen TEEL) adj refined; polite; aristocratic; affecting refinement • The ladies at the ball were too genteel to accept our invitation to the wrestling match. A person who is genteel has gentility.

GLUT

GLUT (glut) n surplus; an overabundance •The international oil shortage turned into an international oil glut with surprising speed. •We had a glut of contributions but a dearth, or scarcity, of volun teers; it seemed that people would rather give their mon ey than their time.

GRANDILOQUENT

GRANDILOQUENT (gran DIL uh kwunt) adj pompous; using a lot of big, fancy words in an attempt to sound impressive •The president's speech was grandiloquent rather than eloquent; there were some six-dollar words and some impressive phrases, but he really had nothing to say. •The new minister's grandiloquence got him in trouble with deacons, who wanted him to be more restrained in his sermons.

GRANDIOSE

GRANDIOSE (GRAN dee ohs) adj absurdly ex ag ger at ed •The scientist's grandiose plan was to build a huge shopping center on the surface of the moon. •Their house was genuinely impressive, although there were a few gran di ose touches: a fireplace the size of a garage, a kitch en with four ovens, and a computerized media center in every room. To be grandiose is to be char ac ter ized by grandiosity (gran dee AHS uh tee).

GREGARIOUS

GREGARIOUS (gruh GAR ee us) adj sociable; enjoying the company of others •Dirk was too gregarious to enjoy the fifty years he spent in soli tary con fine ment. •Kyle wasn't very gregarious; she went to the party, but she spent most of her time hiding in the closet. In biology, gregarious is used to de scribe animals that live in groups. Bees, which live together in large colonies, are said to be gregarious insects.

GUILE

GUILE (gyle) n cunning; duplicity; artfulness •José used guile, not intelligence, to win the spelling bee; he cheated. •Stuart was shocked by the guile of the automobile mechanic, who had poked a hole in his radiator and then told him that it had sprung a leak. To be guileless is to be innocent or naive. Guileless and artless are synonyms. The word beguile also means to deceive, but in a charm ing and not always bad way. • Clarence found Mary's beauty so beguiling that he did any thing she asked of him.

HEDONISM

HEDONISM (HEED uh niz um) n the pursuit of pleasure as a way of life A hedonist practices hedonism twenty-four hours a day. • Yoshi's life of hedonism came to an end when his lottery winnings ran out; his massaging armchair and wide-screen TV were repos sessed, he had to eat macaroni and cheese instead of champagne and lobster, and he could no longer pay to have Victoria's Secret models fan him with palm fronds and feed him grapes.

HACKNEYED

HACKNEYED (HAK need) adj overused; trite; stale •Michael's book was full of clichés and hackneyed phrases. •The intelligent design issue had been discussed so much as to be come hackneyed. "As cold as ice" is a hackneyed expression.

HAPLESS

HAPLESS (HAP lis) adj unlucky •Joe's hapless search for fun led him from one disappointment to another. •Alex led a hapless existence

HARBINGER

HARBINGER (HAR bin jur) n a forerunner; a signal of Warm weather is the harbinger of spring. • A cloud of bad breath and body odor, which preceded him by several yards everywhere he went, was Harold's harbinger.

HERMETIC

HERMETIC (hur MET ik) adj impervious to external influence; airtight •The president led a hermetic existence in the White House, as his advisers attempted to seal him off from the outside world. •The old men felt vulnerable and unwanted outside the her met ic security of their club. •The poisonous substance was sealed hermetically inside a glass cyl in der.

HEYDAY

HEYDAY (HAY day) n golden age; prime •In his heyday, Vernon was a world-class athlete; today he's just Vernon. •The heyday of the British Navy ended a long, long time ago.

HISTRIONIC

HISTRIONIC (his tree AHN ik) adj overly dramatic; theatrical •Adele's histrionic request for a raise embarrassed everyone in the office. She gesticulated wildly, jumped up and down, pulled out hand fuls of hair, threw herself to the ground, and groaned in agony. •The chairman's histrionic presentation persuaded no one. •The young actor's his tri on ics made everyone in the audience squirm. Histrionic behavior is referred to as histrionics.

HOMILY

HOMILY (HAHM uh lee) n a sermon • The football coach often began practice with a lengthy homily on the virtues of clean living.

HUSBANDRY

HUSBANDRY (HUZ bun dree) n thrifty management of re sourc es; livestock farming Husbandry is the practice of con serv ing money or resources. To hus band is to economize. • Everyone husbanded oil and elec tric i ty dur ing the energy crisis of the 1970s.

HYPERBOLE

HYPERBOLE (hye PUR buh lee) n an exaggeration used as a figure of speech; ex ag ger a tion •When Joe said, "I'm so hungry I could eat a horse," he was using hyperbole to convey the extent of his hunger. •The candidate was guilty of hy per bo le; all the facts in his speech were exaggerated.

ICONOCLAST

ICONOCLAST (eye KAHN uh klast) n one who attacks popular beliefs or institutions Iconoclast comes from Greek words meaning image breaker. The original iconoclasts were opponents of the use of icons, or sacred images, in certain Christian churches. Today the word is used to refer to someone who attacks popular figures and ideas—a person to whom "nothing is sacred." •The popular columnist was an inveterate iconoclast, avidly attack ing public figures no matter what their party affiliations. •To study and go to class is to be an iconoclast on that cam pus, which has a reputation for being the biggest party school in the country if not the world. •Herbert's iconoclastic (eye kahn uh KLAS tik) views were not pop u lar with the older members of the board.

MOLLIFY

MOLLIFY (MAHL uh fye) v to soften; to soothe; to pacify •Lucy mollified the angry police officer by kissing his hand. •My father was not mollified by my promise never to crash his car into a brick wall again. •The baby-sitter was unable to mollify the cranky child, who cried all night.

IDIOSYNCRASY

IDIOSYNCRASY (id ee oh SINK ruh see) n a peculiarity; an eccentricity •Eating green beans drenched in ketchup for breakfast was one of Jordana's idiosyncrasies. •The doctor's interest was aroused by an idiosyncrasy in Bill's skull: There seemed to be a coin slot in the back of his head. A person who has an idiosyncrasy is said to be idiosyncratic (id ee oh sin KRAT ik). • Tara's driving was somewhat id io syn crat ic; she some times seemed to prefer the sidewalk to the street.

IDYLLIC

IDYLLIC (eye DIL ik) adj charming in a rustic way; naturally peaceful •They built their house on an idyllic spot. There was a bab bling brook in back and an unbroken view of wooded hills in front. •Our vacation in the country was idyllic; we went for long walks down winding dirt roads and didn't see a news pa per all week. An idyllic time or place could also be called an idyll (EYE dul).

IGNOMINY

IGNOMINY (IG nuh min ee) n deep disgrace •After the big scandal, the formerly high-flying in vestment banker fell into a life of shame and ignominy. •The ignominy of losing the spelling bee was too much for Arnold, who decided to give up spelling altogether. Something that is deeply disgraceful is ignominious (ig nuh MIN ee us). • Lola's plagiarizing of Nabokov's work was an ignominious act that got her suspended from school for two days.

IMPERVIOUS

IMPERVIOUS (im PUR vee us) adj not allowing anything to pass through; im pen e tra ble •A raincoat, if it is any good, is impervious to water. It is made of an impervious material. •David was impervious to criticism—he did what he wanted to do no matter what anyone said.

IMPETUOUS

IMPETUOUS (im PECH oo wus) adj impulsive; extremely im pa tient •Impetuous Dick always seemed to be running off to buy a new car, even if he had just bought one the day before. •Samantha was so impetuous that she never took more than a few seconds to make up her mind.

IMPLEMENT

IMPLEMENT (IM pluh munt) v to carry out •Leo developed a plan for shortening the grass in his yard, but he was unable to implement it because he didn't have a lawn mower. •The government was better at creating new laws than at im ple ment ing them.

IMPUGN

IMPUGN (im PYOON) v to attack, especially to attack the truth or in teg ri ty of some thing •The critic impugned the originality of Jacob's novel, claim ing that long stretches of it had been lifted from the work of someone else. •Fred said I was impugning his honesty when I called him a dirty liar, but I told him he had no honesty to impugn. This just seemed to make him angrier.

INANE

INANE (i NAYN) adj silly; senseless •Their plan to make an indoor swimming pool by flooding their base ment was inane. •Mel made a few inane comments about the im por tance of chewing only on the left side of one's mouth, and then he passed out beneath the table.

INCENSE

INCENSE (in SENS) v to make very angry •Jeremy was incensed when I told him that even though he was stupid and loathsome, he would always be my best friend. •My comment about the lovely painting of a tree in censed the artist, who said it was actually a portrait of his mother.

INCIPIENT

INCIPIENT (in SIP ee unt) adj beginning; emerging •Sitting in class, Henrietta detected an incipient tingle of boredom that told her she would soon be asleep. •Support for the plan was incipient, and the planners hoped it would soon grow and spread. The inception of something is its start or formal beginning.

INCISIVE

INCISIVE (in SYE siv) adj cutting right to the heart of the matter When a surgeon cuts into you, he or she makes an incision. To be incisive is to be as sharp as a scalpel in a figurative sense. •After hours of debate, Louis offered a few incisive com ments that made it immediately clear to everyone how dumb the original idea had been. •Lloyd's essays were always incisive; he never wasted any words, and his reasoning was sharp and persuasive.

INCONGRUOUS

INCONGRUOUS (in KAHN groo us) adj not harmonious; not con sis tent; not ap pro pri ate; not fitting in •The ultramodern kitchen seemed incongruous in the restored eighteenth-century farmhouse. It was an incongruity (in kun GROO uh tee). •Bill's membership in the motorcycle gang was incongruous with his mild personality and his career as a management consultant.

INCREMENT

INCREMENT (IN cruh munt) n an increase; one in a series of increases •Bernard received a small increment in his salary each year, even though he did less and less work with every day that passed. •This year's fund-raising total represented an in cre ment of 1 percent over last year's. This year's total rep resent ed an in cre men tal change from last year's. •Doug built up his savings account incrementally, one dol lar at a time.

INDIGENOUS

INDIGENOUS (in DIJ uh nus) adj native; originating in that area •Fast-food restaurants are indigenous to America, where they were invented. •The grocer said the corn had been locally grown, but it didn't appear to be in dig e nous. •The botanist said that the small cactus was in dig e nous but that the large one had been introduced to the region by Span ish explorers.

INDIGENT

INDIGENT (IN di junt) adj poor •The indigent family had little to eat, nothing to spend, and vir tu al ly nothing to wear. •Rusty had once been a lawyer but now was indigent; he spent most of his time sleeping on a bench in the park. Don't confuse this word with indigenous, listed above.

INDOLENT

INDOLENT (IN duh lunt) adj lazy •The indolent teenagers slept late, moped around, and never looked for summer jobs. •Inheriting a lot of money enabled Rodney to do what he loved most: pursue a life of indolence.

INDULGENT

INDULGENT (in DUL junt) adj lenient; yielding to desire •The nice mom was indulgent of her children, letting them have all the candy, cookies, and ice cream that they wanted, even for break fast. •Our indulgent teacher never punished us for not turning in our home work. She didn't want us to turn into as cet ic grinds. Someone who is self-indulgent yields to his or her every desire. LENIENT =(of punishment or a person in authority) permissive, merciful, or tolerant.

INEFFABLE

INEFFABLE (in EF uh bul) adj incapable of being expressed or de scribed • The simple beauty of nature is often so ineffable that it brings tears to our eyes. The word effable—expressible—is rarely used.

INEPT

INEPT (in EPT) adj clumsy; incompetent; gauche •Joshua is an inept dancer; he is as likely to stomp on his partner's foot as he is to step on it. •Julia's inept attempt at humor drew only groans from the au di ence. To be inept is to be characterized by ineptitude, which is the op po site of aptitude. • The woodworking class's ineptitude was both broad and deep; there was little that they were able to do, and nothing that they were able to do well. The opposite of inept is adept (uh DEPT). Adept and adroit are synonyms.

INEXORABLE

INEXORABLE (in EK sur uh bul) adj relentless; inevitable; un avoid able •The inexorable waves pounded the shore, as they have al ways pound ed it and as they always will pound it. •Eliot drove his father's car slowly but inexorably through the gro cery store, wrecking aisle after aisle despite the man ag er's an guished plead ing. •Inexorable death finds everyone sooner or later.

INFAMOUS

INFAMOUS (IN fuh mus) adj shamefully wicked; having an extremely bad rep u ta tion; disgraceful Be careful with the pronunciation of this word. To be infamous is to be famous for being evil or bad. An infamous cheater is one whose cheating is well known. • Deep within the prison was the infamous torture chamber, where hooded guards tickled their prisoners with feathers until they con fessed. Infamy is the state of being infamous. •The former Nazi lived the rest of his life in infamy after the court con vict ed him of war crimes and atrocities. •President Roosevelt said that the date of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor would "live in infamy."

INFATUATED

INFATUATED (in FACH oo ay tid) adj foolish; foolishly pas sion ate or attract ed; made fool ish; foolishly in love To be infatuated is to be fatuous or foolish. •I was so in fat u at ed with Polly that I drooled and gurgled whenev er she was near. •The infatuated candidate thought so highly of himself that he had the ceiling of his bedroom covered with his campaign posters. •My ride in Boris's racing car infatuated me; I knew im me di ate ly that I would have to have a racing car, too.

INHERENT

INHERENT (in HAIR unt) adj part of the essential nature of some thing; in trin sic Wetness is an inherent quality of water. (You could also say that wetness is inherent in water.) •There is an inherent strength in steel that card board lacks. •The man's inherent fatness, jolliness, and beardedness made it easy for him to play the part of Santa Claus

INNATE

INNATE (i NAYT) adj existing since birth; inborn; inherent •Joseph's kindness was innate; it was part of his nat u ral char ac ter. •Bill has an apparently innate ability to throw a foot ball. You just can't teach someone to throw a ball as well as he can.

INNOCUOUS

INNOCUOUS (i NAHK yoo us) adj harmless; banal Innocuous is closely related, in both origin and meaning, to inno cent. •The speaker's voice was loud but his words were in noc u ous; there was nothing to get excited about. •Meredith took offense at Bruce's innocuous com ment about the salt i ness of her soup.

INORDINATE

INORDINATE (in OR duh nit) adj excessive; unreasonable •The math teacher paid an inordinate amount of attention to the grammar rather than algebra. •The limousine was inordinately large, even for a limousine; there was room for more than a dozen passengers. •Romeo's love for Juliet was perhaps a bit inordinate, given the out come of their relationship.

INSATIABLE

INSATIABLE (in SAY shuh bul) adj hard or impossible to satisfy; greedy; avaricious • Peter had an insatiable appetite for chocolate macadamia ice cream; he could never get enough. Not even a gallon of choco late macadamia was enough to sate (sayt) or satiate (SAY shee ayt) his craving. • Peter's ad dic tion never reached satiety (suh TYE uh tee or SAY she uh tee).

INSIDIOUS

INSIDIOUS (in SID ee us) adj treacherous; sneaky •Winter was insidious; it crept in under the doors and through cracks in the windows. •Cancer, which can spread rapidly from a small cluster of cells, is an insidious disease. TREACHEROUS = guilty of or involving betrayal or deception.

INSIPID

INSIPID (in SIP id) adj dull; bland; banal •Barney's jokes were so insipid that no one in the room man aged to force out so much as a chuckle. •We were bored to death at the party; it was full of insipid people making insipid conversation. •The thin soup was so insipid that all the spices in the world could not have made it interesting. DULL = lacking interest or excitement; lacking brightness, vividness, or sheen.

INSULAR

INSULAR (IN suh lur) adj like an island; isolated The Latin word for island is insula. From it we get the words penin su la ("almost an island"), insulate (insulation makes a house an island of heat), and insular, among others. •Lying flat on his back in bed for twenty-seven years, the 1,200pound man led an insular existence •The insular little community had very little contact with the world around it. Something that is insular has insularity. • The in su lar i ty of the little com mu ni ty was so complete that it was im pos si ble to buy a big-city newspaper there.

INSURGENT

INSURGENT (in SUR junt) n a rebel; someone who revolts against a gov ern ment • The heavily armed insurgents rushed into the presidential palace, but they paused to taste the fresh blueberry pie on the dinner table and were captured by the president's bodyguards. This word can also be an adjective. A rebellion is an in sur gent activity. Insurgency is another word for rebellion; so is insurrection.

INTRACTABLE

INTRACTABLE (in TRAK tuh bul) adj uncontrollable; stub born; dis obe di ent •The intractable child was a torment to his nursery school teacher. •Lavanya was intractable in her opposition to pay in creas es for the li brary em ploy ees; she swore she would never vote to give them a raise. •The disease was intractable. None of the dozens of med i cines the doctor tried had the slightest effect on it. The opposite of intractable is tractable.

INTRANSIGENT

INTRANSIGENT (in TRAN suh junt) adj uncompromising; stubborn •Vijay was an intransigent hard-liner, and he didn't care how many people he offended with his views. •The jury was unanimous except for one in tran si gent mem ber, who didn't believe that anyone should ever be forced to go to jail. The noun is intransigence.

INTRINSIC

INTRINSIC (in TRIN sik) adj part of the essential nature of something; in her ent •Larry's intrinsic boldness was always getting him into trou ble. •There was an intrinsic problem with Owen's alibi: It was a lie. The opposite of intrinsic is extrinsic.

INTROSPECTIVE

INTROSPECTIVE (in truh SPEC tiv) adj tending to think about one self; ex am in ing one's feel ings •The introspective six-year-old never had much to say to other peo ple but always seemed to be turning some thing over in her mind. •Randy's in tro spec tive examination of his motives led him to con clude that he must have been at fault in the breakup of his mar riage. See extrovert, listed previously.

INUNDATE

INUNDATE (IN un dayt) v to flood; to cover completely with water; to over whelm •The tiny island kingdom was inundated by the tidal wave. For-tu nate ly, no one died from the deluge. •The mother was inundated with telegrams and gifts after she gave birth to octuplets.

INVECTIVE

INVECTIVE (in VEK tiv) n insulting or abusive speech •The critic's searing review was filled with bitterness and invec tive. •Herman wasn't much of an orator, but he was brilliant at invec tive.

INVETERATE

INVETERATE (in VET ur it) adj habitual; firm in habit; deep ly rooted •Eric was such an inveterate liar on the golf course that when he finally made a hole-in-one, he marked it on his score card as a zero. •Larry's practice of spitting into the fireplace be came in vet er ate de spite his wife's protestations.

IRASCIBLE

IRASCIBLE (i RAS uh bul) adj easily angered or provoked; irritable A grouch is irascible. • The CEO was so irascible, his em ploy ees were afraid to talk to him for fear he might hurl pa per weights at them.

IRREVOCABLE

IRREVOCABLE (i REV uh kuh bul) adj irreversible To revoke (ri VOHK) is to take back. Something irrevocable can not be taken back. •My decision not to wear a Tarzan cos tume and ride on a float in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is irrevocable; there is ab so lute ly nothing you could do or say to make me change my mind. •Shortly after his car began to plunge toward the sea, Tom decid ed not to drive off th

ITINERANT

ITINERANT (eye TIN ur unt) adj moving from place to place •The life of a traveling salesman is an itinerant one. •The itinerant junk dealer passes through our neighborhood every month or so, pulling his wagon of odds and ends. •The international banker's itinerant lifestyle began to seem less glam orous to him after his first child was born. A closely related word is itinerary, which is the planned route or sched ule of a trip. • The trav el ing salesman taped his itinerary to the refrigerator be fore every trip so that his wife would know how to reach him on the telephone.

METAMORPHOSIS

METAMORPHOSIS (met uh MOR fuh sis) n a magical change in form; a striking or sudden change •When the magician passed his wand over Eileen's head, she under went a bizarre metamorphosis: She turned into a hamster. •Damon's metamorphosis from college student to Hollywood super star was so sudden that it seemed a bit unreal. To undergo a metamorphosis is to metamorphose.

MILIEU

MILIEU (mil YOO) n environment; surroundings •A caring and involved community is the proper milieu for raising a family. •The farmer on vacation in the big city felt out of his milieu.

MISANTHROPIC

MISANTHROPIC (mis un THRAHP ik) adj hating mankind A misogynist (mis AH juh nist) hates women. A misanthropic per son doesn't make dis tinc tions; he or she hates everyone. The op po site of a mis an thrope (MIS un throhp) is a philanthropist (fuh LAN thruh pist). Cu ri ous ly, there is no word for some one who hates men only.

MITIGATE

MITIGATE (MIT uh gayt) v to moderate the effect of some thing •The sense of imminent disaster was mitigated by the guide's calm behavior and easy smile. •The effects of the disease were mitigated by the ex per i men tal drug treatment. •Nothing Joel said could mitigate the enormity of forgetting his moth er-in-law's birthday. Unmitigated means absolute, unmoderated, not made less intense or severe.

amenable

It means easily persuaded; disposed or willing to comply If a disease is amenable, it can be treated. AMENABLE (uh MEE nuh bul) adj obedient; willing to give in to the wishes of an oth er; agreeable •I suggested that Bert pay for my lunch as well as for his own; to my surprise, he was amenable. •The plumber was amenable to my paying my bill with jelly beans, which was lucky, because I had more jelly beans than money.

anomalous

It means not normal, out of ordinary. Anomalous can be used to describe something that is not typical, like an unusually California spring. deviating from the general or common order or type

ambiguous

It means open to more than one interpretation. Let's say that a have two friends, Bob and Paul. If I tell you that he is coming to my house today, then that's ambigous. having more than one possible meaning AMBIGUOUS (am BIG yoo us) adj unclear in meaning; con fus ing; ca pa ble of being in ter pret ed in different ways •We listened to the weather report, but the forecast was ambig u ous; we couldn't tell whether the day was going to be rainy or sunny. •The poem we read in English class was ambiguous; no one had any idea what the poet was trying to say. The noun is ambiguity (am bih GYOO uh tee).

amorphous

It means shapeless --> it lacks shape. having no definite form or distinct shape AMORPHOUS (uh MOR fus) adj shapeless; without a regular or stable shape; bloblike •Ed's teacher said that his term paper was amorphous; it was as shapeless and disorganized as a cloud. •The sleepy little town was engulfed by an amorphous blob of glowing protoplasm—a higher intelligence from outer space.

JUDICIOUS

JUDICIOUS (joo DISH us) adj exercising sound judgment •The judge was far from judicious; he told the jury that he thought the defendant looked guilty and said that anyone who would wear a red bow tie into a courtroom deserved to be sent to jail.

JUXTAPOSE

JUXTAPOSE (JUK stuh pohz) v to place side by side •Comedy and tragedy were juxtaposed in the play, which was al ter nate ly funny and sad. •Juxtaposing the genuine painting and the counterfeit made it much easier to tell which was which. The noun is juxtaposition (juk stuh puh ZISH un).

MELLIFLUOUS

MELLIFLUOUS (muh LIF loo us) adj sweetly flowing Mellifluous comes from Greek words meaning, roughly, "hon ey flow ing." We use the word almost exclusively to de scribe voices, mu sic, or sounds that flow sweetly, like honey. • Melanie's clarinet playing was mellifluous; the notes flowed smooth ly and beautifully.

MENDACIOUS

MENDACIOUS (men DAY shus) adj lying; dishonest Thieves are naturally mendacious. If you ask them what they are do ing, they will automatically answer, "Nothing." • The jury saw through the mendacious witness and convicted the de fen dant. To be mendacious is to engage in mendacity, or lying. I have no flaws, except occasional mendacity. Don't confuse this word with mendicant, listed below.

LACONIC

LACONIC (luh KAHN ik) adj using few words, especially to the point of seem ing rude •The manager's laconic dismissal letter left the fired em ploy ees feel ing angry and hurt. •When she went backstage, June discovered why the pop u lar rock musician was so laconic in public: His voice was high and squeaky.

LAMPOON

LAMPOON (lam POON) v to satirize; to mock; to parody •The irreverent students mercilessly lampooned their Latin teacher's lisp in a skit at the school talent show. •The Harvard Lampoon, the nation's oldest humor magazine, has lam pooned just about everything there is to lampoon.

LANGUISH

LANGUISH (LANG gwish) v to become weak, listless, or depressed •The formerly eager and vigorous accountant languished in his tedious job at the international conglomerate. •The longer Jill remained unemployed, the more she lan guished and the less likely it became that she would find an oth er job. To languish is to be languid. • The child seemed so languid that his father thought he was sick and called the doctor. It turned out that the little boy had simply had an overdose of television.

LARGESS

LARGESS (lahr JES) n generous giving of gifts (or the gifts them selves); generosity; philanthropy • Sam was marginally literate at best. Only the largess of his uncle got Sam into Princeton. Largess can also be spelled largesse.

LAUD

LAUD (lawd) v to praise; to applaud; to extol; to celebrate • The bank manager lauded the hero who trapped the escaping robber. The local newspaper published a laudatory editorial on this intrepid individual. Laudatory means praising. Giving several million dollars to charity is a laudable act of philanthropy. Laudable means praiseworthy.

LETHARGY

LETHARGY (LETH ur jee) n sluggishness; laziness; drows i ness; in dif fer ence •The couch potato had fallen into a state of such total leth ar gy that he never moved except to change channels or get an oth er bag of chips from the kitchen. •The lethargy of the library staff caused what should have been a quick errand to expand into a full day's work. To be filled with lethargy is to be lethargic. • The lethargic (luh THAR jik) teenagers took all summer to paint the Hendersons' garage. sluggishness: Indisposed to action or exertion; lacking in energy; lazy; indolent: a sluggish disposition. 2. not acting or working with full vigor, as bodily organs: a sluggish liver.

LEVITY

LEVITY (LEV uh tee) n lightness; frivolity; unseriousness To levitate something is to make it so light that it floats up into the air. Levity comes from the same root and has to do with a different kind of lightness. •The speaker's levity was not appreciated by the convention of fu ner al directors, who felt that a convention of funeral di rec tors was no place to tell jokes. •The judge's attempt to inject some levity into the dreary court pro ceed ings (by setting off a few firecrackers in the jury box) was entirely successful.

LIBEL

LIBEL (LYE bul) n a written or published falsehood that in jures the rep u ta tion of, or defames, someone • The executive said that the newspaper had committed libel when it called him a stinking, no-good, corrupt, in com pe tent, over paid, lying, worthless moron. He claimed that the newspa per had libeled him, and that its de scrip tion of him had been li bel ous. At the trial, the jury dis agreed, saying that the news pa per's description of the executive had been sub stan tial ly accurate. Slander is just like libel except that it is spoken instead of written. To slander someone is to say something untrue that injures that person's reputation.

LOQUACIOUS

LOQUACIOUS (loh KWAY shus) adj talking a lot or too much •The child was surprisingly loquacious for one so small. •Mary is so loquacious that Belinda can sometimes put down the telephone receiver and run a load of laundry while Mary is talk ing. A loquacious person is one who is characterized by lo qua cious ness or loquacity (loh KWAS uh tee). • The English teacher's loquacity in class left little time for any of the students to speak, which was fine with most of them.

LUGUBRIOUS

LUGUBRIOUS (loo GOO bree us) adj exaggeratedly mourn ful To be mournful is to be sad and sorrowful. To be lu gu bri ous is to make a big show of being sad and sorrowful. •Harry's lugubrious eulogy at the funeral of his dog even tu al ly made everyone start giggling. •The valedictorian sud den ly turned lugubrious and began sobbing and tearing her hair at the thought of graduating from high school.

MENDICANT

MENDICANT (MEN di kunt) n a beggar • The presence of thousands of mendicants in every urban area is a sad commentary on our national priorities. BEGGAR = a person, typically a homeless one, who lives by asking for money or food.

MACHINATION

MACHINATION (mak uh NAY shun) n scheming activity for an evil purpose This word is almost always used in the plural—mach i na tions—in which form it means the same thing. •The ruthless mach i na tions of the mobsters left a trail of blood and bodies. •The machinations of the conspirators were aimed at nothing less than the overthrow of the government. This word is often used imprecisely to mean something like "machine like activity." It should not be used in this way.

MAGNANIMOUS

MAGNANIMOUS (mag NAN uh mus) adj forgiving; unresentful; noble in spirit; generous •The boxer was mag nan i mous in defeat, telling the sports report ers that his opponent had simply been too talented for him to beat. •Mrs. Jones mag nan i mous ly offered the little boy a cookie when he came over to confess that he had accidentally broken her win dow while playing baseball. To be mag nan i mous is to have magnanimity (mag nuh NIM uh tee). • The magnanimity of the conquering general was much ap pre ci at ed by the defeated soldiers.

MALAISE

MALAISE (ma LAYZ) n a feeling of depression, uneasiness, or queasiness • Malaise descended on the calculus class when the teacher announced a quiz.

MALFEASANCE

MALFEASANCE (mal FEE zuns) n an illegal act, especially by a pub lic official • President Ford officially pardoned former president Nixon before the latter could be convicted of any malfeasance.

MALIGNANT

MALIGNANT (muh LIG nuhnt) adj causing harm Many words that start with mal- connote evil or harm, just as words that begin with ben- generally have good connotations. Malignant and benign are often used to describe tumors or physical conditions that are either life-threatening or not. • Lina has had recurring tumors since the operation; we're just glad that none of them have proved malignant.

MALINGER

MALINGER (muh LING ger) v to pretend to be sick to avoid doing work •Indolent Leon always malingered when it was his turn to clean up the house. •Arthur is artful and he always manages to ma lin ger before a big exam.

MAINFEST

MANIFEST (MAN uh fest) adj visible; evident • Daryl's anger at us was manifest: You could see it in his ex-pres sion and hear it in his voice. There is manifest danger in riding a pogo stick along the edge of a cliff. Manifest can also be a verb, in which case it means to show, to make visible, or to make evident. •Lee has been sick for a very long time, but it was only recent ly that he began to man i fest symp toms. •Rebecca manifested alarm when we told her that the end of her ponytail was on fire, but she didn't do any thing to put it out. A visible sign of something is called a manifestation of it. A lack of comfort and luxury is the most obvious man i fes ta tion of poverty.

MARSHAL

MARSHAL (MAHR shul) v to arrange in order; to gather together for the pur pose of doing something •The statistician marshaled his facts before making his pre sen ta tion. •The general marshaled his troops in anticipation of making an at tack on the enemy fortress. •We marshaled half a dozen local groups in opposition to the city council's plan to bulldoze our neighborhood.

MAUDLIN

MAUDLIN (MAWD lin) adj silly and overly sentimental •The high school reunion grew more and more maudlin as the par tic i pants shared more and more memories. •Magdalen had a maudlin concern for the worms in her yard; she would bang a gong before walking in the grass in order to give them a chance to get out of her way.

MAVERICK

MAVERICK (MAV ur ik) n a nonconformist; a rebel The word maverick originated in the Old West. It is derived from the name of Samuel A. Maverick, a Texas banker who once accepted a herd of cattle in payment of a debt. Maverick was a banker, not a rancher. He failed to confine or brand his calves, which habitually wandered into his neighbors' pastures. Local ranchers got in the habit of referring to any unbranded calf as a maverick. The word is now used for anyone who has refused to be "branded"—who has refused to con form. • The political scientist was an intellectual maverick; most of his the o ries had no followers except himself. Maverick can also be an adjective. • The maverick police offic er got in trouble with the department for using illegal means to track down crim i nals.

MAXIM

MAXIM (MAK sim) n a fundamental principle; an old say ing •We always tried to live our lives according to the maxim that it is better to give than to receive. •No one in the entire world is entirely certain of the differenc es in meaning among the words maxim, adage, proverb, and aph o rism.

MEDIATE

MEDIATE (MEE dee ayt) v to help settle differences •The United Nations representative tried to mediate between the war ring countries, but the soldiers just kept shooting at one an oth er. •Joe carried messages back and forth between the divorcing hus band and wife in the hope of mediating their differences. To mediate is to engage in mediation. When two opposing groups, such as a trade union and the man age ment of a com pa ny, try to settle their differences through mediation, they call in a mediator to listen to their cases and make an equitable decision.

MONOLITHIC

MONOLITHIC (mah nuh LITH ik) adj massive, solid, uni form, and unyield ing A monolith is a huge stone shaft or column. Many other things can be said to be monolithic. A huge corporation is often said to be monolithic, especially if it is enormous and powerful and all its parts are dedicated to the same purpose. If the opposition to a plan were said to be monolithic, it would probably consist of a large group of people who all felt the same way.

MOROSE

MOROSE (muh ROHS) adj gloomy; sullen •Louise was always so morose about everything that she was nev er any fun to be with. •New Yorkers always seemed morose to the writer who lived in the country; they seemed beaten down by the vast, un friend ly city in which they lived. GLOOMY = dark or poorly lit, especially so as to appear depressing or frightening.

MORTIFY

MORTIFY (MOR tuh fye) adj to humiliate •I was mortified when my father asked my girlfriend wheth er she thought I was a dumb, pathetic wimp. •We had a mortifying experience at the opera; when Stanley sneezed, the entire orchestra stopped playing and stared at him for several minutes.

MUNDANE

MUNDANE (mun DAYN) adj ordinary; pretty boring; not heav en ly and eternal •My day was filled with mundane chores: I mowed the lawn, did the laundry, and fed the dog. •Dee's job was so mundane she sometimes had trouble remem ber ing whether she was at work or asleep. •The monk's thoughts were far removed from mundane concerns; he was contemplating all the fun he was going to have in heaven.

MUNIFICENT

MUNIFICENT (myoo NIF uh sunt) adj very generous; lavish •The munificent millionaire gave lots of money to any char i ty that came to him with a request. •Mrs. Bigelow was a mu nif i cent hostess; there was so much wonder ful food and wine at her dinner parties that the guests had to rest between cours es. She was known for her mu nif i cence.

MYRIAD

MYRIAD (MIR ee ud) n a huge number •A country sky on a clear night is filled with a myriad of stars. •There are a myriad of reasons why I don't like school. This word can also be used as an adjective. Myriad stars is a lot of stars. The teenager was weighted down by the myriad anx i eties of adolescence.

animosity

Meaning intense hostility, animosity should be reserved for extreme cases. a feeling of ill will arousing active hostility

NEBULOUS

NEBULOUS (NEB yuh lus) adj vague; hazy; indistinct •Oscar's views are so nebulous that no one can figure out what he thinks about anything. •The community's bound aries are somewhat nebulous; where they are de pends on whom you ask. •Molly's expensive new hairdo was a sort of nebulous mass of wisps, waves, and hair spray. A nebula (NEB yuh luh) is an interstellar cloud, the plural of which is nebulae (NEB yuh lee).

NEFARIOUS

NEFARIOUS (ni FAR ee us) adj evil; flagrantly wicked •The radicals' nefarious plot was to destroy New York by filling the reservoirs with strawberry Jell-O. •The convicted murderer had committed a myriad of ne far i ous acts.

NOTORIOUS

NOTORIOUS (noh TOR ee us) adj famous for something bad A well-known actor is famous; a well-known criminal is no to ri ous. •No one wanted to play poker with Jeremy be cause he was a no to ri ous cheater. •Rana's practical jokes were notorious; people always kept their distance when she came into the room. To be notorious is to have notoriety (noh tuh RYE uh tee). • Jesse's notoriety as a bank robber made it difficult for him to find a job in banking.

NOVEL

NOVEL (NAHV ul) adj new; original •Ray had a novel approach to homework: He didn't do it. •There was noth ing novel about the author's latest novel; the char ac ters were old, and the plot was borrowed.

NOXIOUS

NOXIOUS (NAHK shus) adj harmful; offensive •Smoking is a noxious habit in every sense. •Poison ivy is a noxious weed. •The mothers' committee believed that rock 'n' roll music exert ed a noxious influence on their children.

NUANCE

NUANCE (NOO ahns) n a subtle difference or distinction •The artist's best work explored the nuance between dark ness and deep shadow. •Harry was incapable of nuance; ev ery thing for him was either black or white.

OBDURATE

OBDURATE (AHB duh rit) adj stubborn and insensitive Obdurate contains one of the same roots as durable and en dur ance; each word conveys a different sense of hardness. •The committee's obdurate refusal to listen to our plan was heartbreak ing to us since we had spent ten years com ing up with it. •The child begged and begged to have a bub ble-gum ma chine installed in his bedroom, but his parents were obdurate in their in sis tence that he have a soft-drink machine instead.

OBFUSCATE

OBFUSCATE (AHB fuh skayt) v to darken; to confuse; to make con fus ing •The spokesman's attempt to explain what the president had meant merely obfuscated the issue further. People had hoped the spokes man would elucidate the issue. •Too much gin had obfuscated the old man's senses. •The professor's inept lecture gradually ob fus cat ed a subject that had been crystal clear to us before. To obfuscate something is to en gage in obfuscation. • Lester called himself a used-car sales man, but his real job was ob fus ca tion: He sold cars by con fus ing his customers.

OBLIQUE

OBLIQUE (oh BLEEK) adj indirect; at an angle In geometry, lines are said to be oblique if they are neither parallel nor per pen dic u lar to one another. The word has a related meaning outside of math e mat ics. An oblique state ment is one that does not directly ad dress the topic at hand, that approaches it as if from an angle. An allusion could be said to be an oblique reference. An oblique argument is one that does not directly confront its true subject. To insult someone obliquely is to do so indirectly. • Essence sprinkled her student council speech with oblique referenc es to the prin ci pal's new toupee; the principal is so dense that he never figured out what was going on, but the rest of us were rolling on the floor.

OBLIVION

OBLIVION (uh BLIV ee un) n total forgetfulness; the state of being forgotten •A few of the young actors would find fame, but most were headed for oblivion. •After tossing and turning with anxiety for most of the night, Marisol finally found the oblivion of sleep. To be oblivious is to be forgetful or unaware. •Old age had made the retired professor oblivious of all his old the o ries. •The workmen stomped in and out of the room, but the happy child, playing on the floor, was oblivious of all dis trac tion. It is also acceptable to say "oblivious to" rather than "oblivious of."

OBSCURE

OBSCURE (ub SKYOOR) adj unknown; hard to understand; dark •The comedy nightclub was filled with obscure comedians who stole one another's jokes and seldom got any laughs. •The artist was so obscure that even his parents had trouble remem ber ing his name. •The noted scholar's dissertation was terribly obscure; it had to be translated from English into English before anyone could make head or tail of it. •Some contemporary poets apparently believe that the only way to be great is to be obscure. •The features of the forest grew obscure as night fell. The state of being obscure in any of its senses is called ob scu ri ty.

OBSEQUIOUS

OBSEQUIOUS (ub SEE kwee us) adj fawning; subservient; sucking up to •Ann's assistant was so obsequious that she could never tell what he really thought about anything. •My obsequious friend seemed to live only to make me happy and never wanted to do anything if I said I didn't want to do it. FAWNING = displaying exaggerated flattery or affection; obsequious. SUBSERVIENT = prepared to obey others unquestioningly.

OBTUSE

OBTUSE (ahb TOOS) adj insensitive; blockheaded •Karen was so obtuse that she didn't realize for several days that Caleb had asked her to marry him. •The obtuse student couldn't seem to grasp the difference between addition and subtraction.

OFFICIOUS

OFFICIOUS (uh FISH us) adj annoyingly eager to help or advise •The officious officer could never resist sticking his nose into other people's business. •The officious salesperson refused to leave us alone, so we fi nal ly left without buying anything. Note carefully the pronunciation of this word.

ONEROUS

ONEROUS (AHN ur us) adj burdensome; oppressive •We were given the onerous task of cleaning up the fairgrounds after the carnival. •The job had long hours, but the work wasn't onerous; Bill spent most of his time sitting with his feet on the desk. BURDENSOME = difficult to carry out or fulfill; taxing.

PRECEPT

PRECEPT (PREE sept) n a rule to live by; a principle es tab lish ing a cer tain kind of action or behavior; a maxim • "Love thy neighbor" is a precept we have sometimes found diffi cult to follow; our neighbor is a noisy oaf who painted his house electric blue and who throws his empty beer cans into our yard.

OPAQUE

OPAQUE (oh PAYK) adj impossible to see through; im pos si ble to un der-stand •The windows in the movie star's house were made not of glass but of some opaque material intended to keep his fans from spying on him. •We tried to figure out what Horace was thinking, but his expres sion was opaque: It revealed nothing. •Jerry's mind, assuming he had one, was opaque. •The statement was opaque; no one could make anything of it. The noun form of opaque is opacity (oh PAS uh tee).

OPULENT

OPULENT (AHP yuh lunt) adj luxurious •Everything in the opulent palace was made of gold—except the toilet-paper holder, which was made of platinum. •The investment banker had grown so accustomed to an opulent lifestyle that he had trouble adjusting to the federal pen i ten tia ry. Opulence is often ostentatious.

OSTENSIBLE

OSTENSIBLE (ah STEN suh bul) adj apparent (but mis lead ing); professed •Blake's ostensible mission was to repair a broken telephone, but his real goal was to eavesdrop on the boss's conversation. •Trevor's ostensible kindness to squirrels belied his deep hatred of them. PROFESSED = (of a quality, feeling, or belief) claimed or asserted openly but often falsely.

PARSIMONIOUS

PARSIMONIOUS (pahr suh MOH nee us) adj stingy •The widow was so parsimonious that she hung used teabags out to dry on her clothesline so that she would be able to use them again. •We tried to be parsimonious, but without success. After just a couple of days at the resort we realized that we had spent all the money we had set aside for our entire month-long vaca tion. STINGY = unwilling to give or spend; ungenerous.

PROFLIGATE

PROFLIGATE (PRAHF luh git) adj extravagantly wasteful and, usu al ly, wild ly im mor al •The fraternity members were a profligate bunch; they held all-night orgies on weeknights and nearly burned down their frater ni ty house with their parties every weekend. •The young heir was profligate with his fortune, spending millions on champagne and racehorses.

PAINSTAKING

PAINSTAKING (PAYN stay king) adj extremely careful; tak ing pains Painstaking = pains-taking = taking pains. • The jeweler was painstaking in his effort not to ruin the $50 million diamond PAINS = Careful Effort

PALLIATE

PALLIATE (PAL ee ayt) v to relieve or alleviate something with out get ting rid of the problem; to assuage; to mitigate • You take aspirin in the hope that it will palliate your headache. As pi rin is a palliative

PALTRY

PALTRY (PAWL tree) adj insignificant; worthless •The law yer's efforts on our behalf were paltry; they didn't add up to anything. •The paltry fee he paid us was scarcely large enough to cover our ex pens es.

PANACEA

PANACEA (pan uh SEE uh) n something that cures ev ery thing •The administration seemed to believe that a tax cut would be a pan a cea for the country's economic ills. •Granny believed that her "rheumatiz medicine" was a pan a cea. No mat ter what you were sick with, that was what she prescribed.

PARADIGM

PARADIGM (PAR uh dime) n a model or example •Mr. Hufstader is the best teacher in the whole world; his classroom should be the paradigm for all classrooms. •In selecting her ward robe, messy Ana ap parent ly used a scarecrow as her paradigm. A paradigm is paradigmatic (par uh dig MAT ik). • Virtually all the cars the com pa ny pro duced were based on a single, par a dig mat ic design.

PARADOX

PARADOX (PAR uh dahks) n a true statement or phe nom e non that none-the less seems to contradict itself; an untrue statement or phe nom e non that none the less seems logical •Mr. Cooper is a political paradox; he's a staunch Republican who votes only for Democrats. •One of Xeno's paradoxes seems to prove the im pos si bil i ty of an ar row's ever reaching its target: If the arrow first moves half the distance to the target, then half the remaining dis tance, then half the remaining dis tance, and so on, it can never ar rive. A paradox is par a dox i cal. • Pasquale's dislike of ice cream was par a dox i cal con sid er ing that he worked as an ice-cream taster.

PAROCHIAL

PAROCHIAL (puh ROH kee ul) adj narrow or confined in point of view; provincial •The townspeople's concerns were entirely parochial; they worried only about what happened in their town and not about the larger world around it. •The journalist's parochial point of view prevented him from be com ing a nationally known figure. A lot of people think a parochial school is a religious school. Traditionally, a parochial school is just the school of the parish or neighborhood. In other con texts parochial has negative con no ta tions.

PARTISAN

PARTISAN (PAHR tuh zun) n one who supports a particular person, cause, or idea •Henry's plan to give himself the award had no partisan except himself. •I am the partisan of any candidate who promises not to make promises. •The mountain village was attacked by partisans of the rebel chief tain. Partisan can also be used as an adjective meaning biased, as in partisan pol i tics. An issue that everyone agrees on regardless of the party he or she belongs to is a nonpartisan issue. Bipartisan means supported by two (bi) parties. • Both the Republican and Dem o crat ic senators voted to give them selves a raise. The motion had bipartisan support.

PATENT

PATENT (PAYT unt) adj obvious •To say that the earth is flat is a patent absurdity since the world is obviously spherical. •It was patently foolish of Lee to think that he could sail across the Pacific Ocean in a washtub.

PATRICIAN

PATRICIAN (puh TRISH un) n a person of noble birth; an aristocrat • Mr. Perno was a patrician, and he was never truly happy un less his place at the dinner table was set with at least half a dozen forks. Patrician can also be an adjective. Polo is a patrician sport. • The noisy crowd on the luxury ocean liner was patrician in dress but not in behavior; they were wearing tuxedos but throwing deck chairs into the ocean.

PATRONIZE

PATRONIZE (PAY truh nyze) v to treat as an inferior; to condescend to •Our guide at the art gallery was extremely patronizing, treating us as though we wouldn't be able to distinguish a painting from a piece of sidewalk without her help. •We felt patronized by the waiter at the fancy restaurant; he ignored all our efforts to attract his attention and then pre tend ed not to understand our accents. Patronize also means to frequent or be a regular customer of. To patronize a restaurant is to eat there often, not to treat it as an inferior.

PAUCITY

PAUCITY (PAW suh tee) n scarcity •There was a paucity of fresh vegetables at the supermarket, so we had to buy frozen ones. •The plan was defeated by a paucity of support. •There is no paucity of water in the ocean.

PEDANTIC

PEDANTIC (puh DAN tik) adj boringly scholarly or ac a dem ic •The discussion quickly turned pedantic as each par tic i pant tried to sound more learned than all the others. •The professor's in ter pre ta tion of the poem was pedantic and empty of genuine feeling. A pedantic person is called a pedant (PED unt). A pedant is fond of pedantry (PED un tree).

PEDESTRIAN

PEDESTRIAN (puh DES tree un) adj unimaginative; banal A pedestrian is someone walking, but to be pedestrian is to be something else altogether. •Mary Anne said the young artist's work was brilliant, but I found it to be pe des tri an; I've seen better paintings in kin der gar ten class rooms. •The menu was pedestrian; I had encountered each of the dishes dozens of times before.

PENCHANT

PENCHANT (PEN chunt) n a strong taste or liking for some thing; a predi lec tion • Dogs have a penchant for chasing cats and mailmen.

PENSIVE

PENSIVE (PEN siv) adj thoughtful and sad • Norton became suddenly pensive when Jack mentioned his dead father.

PEREMPTORY

PEREMPTORY (puh REMP tuh ree) adj final; categorical; dic ta to ri al Someone who is peremptory says or does something with out giving anyone a chance to dispute it. • Asher's father peremptorily banished him to his room. Note carefully the pronunciation of this word.

PERENNIAL

PERENNIAL (puh REN ee ul) adj continual; happening again and again or year after year •Mr. Lorenzo is a perennial favorite of students at the high school be cause he always gives everyone an A. •Milton was a perennial candidate for governor; every four years he print ed up another batch of his bingo and horse rac ing bumper stick ers. Flowers called perennials are flowers that bloom year after year without being replanted. Biennial (bye EN ee ul) and centennial (sen TEN ee ul) are related words. Bi en ni al means hap pen ing once every two years (biannual means hap pen ing twice a year). Centennial means happening once every century.

PERFIDY

PERFIDY (PUR fuh dee) n treachery •It was the criminals' natural perfidy that finally did them in, as each one became an informant on the other. •I was ap palled at Al's perfidy. He had sworn to me that he was my best friend, but then he asked my girlfriend to the prom. To engage in perfidy is to be perfidious (pur FID ee us). TREACHERY = betrayal of trust; deceptive action or nature.

PERFUNCTORY

PERFUNCTORY (pur FUNGK tuh ree) adj unenthusiastic; careless •John made a couple of perfunctory attempts at answering the ques tions on the test, but then he put down his pencil and his head and slept until the end of the period. •Sandra's lawn mowing was perfunctory at best: She skipped all the diffi cult parts and didn't rake up any of the clippings.

PERIPATETIC

PERIPATETIC (per uh peh TET ik) adj wandering; traveling continually; itinerant • Groupies are a peripatetic bunch, traveling from concert to concert to follow their favorite rock stars.

PERMEATE

PERMEATE (PUR mee ayt) v to spread or seep through; to penetrate •A horrible smell quickly permeated the room after Jock lit a cig a rette. •Corruption had permeated the company; every single one of its ex ec u tives belonged in jail. Something that can be permeated is said to be permeable. A per me able rain coat is one that lets water seep through.

PERNICIOUS

PERNICIOUS (pur NISH us) adj deadly; extremely evil •The drug dealers conducted their pernicious business on every street cor ner in the city. •Lung cancer is a pernicious disease.

PERQUISITE

PERQUISITE (PUR kwuh zit) n a privilege that goes along with a job; a "perk" •Free access to a photocopier is a perquisite of most office jobs. •The big corporate lawyer's perquisites included a chauffeured limousine, a luxurious apartment in the city, and all the choco late ice cream he could eat.

PERUSE

PERUSE (puh ROOZ) v to read carefully This word is mis used more often than it is used correctly. To peruse some thing is not to skim it or read it quickly. To peruse some thing is to study it or read it with great care. • The lawyer perused the contract for many hours, looking for a loop hole that would enable his client to back out of the deal. To pe ruse something is to engage in perusal. • My perusal of the ancient texts brought me no closer to my goal of discovering the meaning of life.

PERVADE

PERVADE (pur VAYD) v to spread throughout •A terrible smell pervaded the apartment building after the sew er main exploded. •On examination day, the classroom was pervaded by a sense of im mi nent doom. Something that pervades is pervasive. •There was a pervasive feel ing of despair on Wall Street on the day the Dow-Jones industrial average fell more than 500 points. •There was a pervasive odor of fuel oil in the house, and we soon dis cov ered why: The basement was filled with the stuff.

PHILISTINE

PHILISTINE (FIL i steen) n a smugly ignorant person with no ap pre ci a tion of in tel lec tu al or artistic matters • The novelist dismissed his critics as philistines, saying they wouldn't rec og nize a good book if it crawled up and bit them on the nose; the critics, in reply, dismissed the novelist as a philistine who wouldn't recognize a good book if it crawled up and rolled itself into his type writ er. Philistine can also be an adjective. To be philistine is to act like a phi lis tine.

PIOUS

PIOUS (PYE us) adj reverent or devout; outwardly (and some times false ly) rev er ent or devout; hypocritical This is a sometimes confusing word with meanings that are very nearly opposite each other. A pious Presbyterian is one who goes to church every Sunday and says his prayers every night before bed. Pious in this sense means something like religiously dutiful. Pious can also be used to describe behavior or feelings that aren't reli gious at all but are quite hypocritical. • The adulterous min is ter's sermon on marital fidelity was filled with pious dis regard for his own sins. The state of being pious is piety (PYE uh tee). The opposite of pious is impious (IM pee us).

PIVOTAL

PIVOTAL (PIV uh tul) adj crucial Pivotal is the adjective form of the verb to pivot. To pivot is to turn on a single point or shaft. A basketball player pivots when he turns while leav ing one foot planted in the same place on the floor. A pivotal comment is a comment that turns a discussion. It is an im por tant comment. A pivotal member of a committee is a crucial or im por tant mem ber of a committee. • Sofia's contribution was pivotal; without it, we would have failed.

PLACATE

PLACATE (PLAY kayt) v to pacify; to appease; to soothe •The tribe placated the angry volcano by tossing a few teen ag ers into the raging crater. •The beleaguered general tried to placate his fierce attacker by sending him a pleasant flower arrangement. His implacable en e my decided to attack anyway.

PLAINTIVE

PLAINTIVE (PLAYN tiv) adj expressing sadness or sorrow •The lead singer's plaintive love song expressed his sorrow at being aban doned by his girlfriend for the lead guitarist. •The chilly autumn weather made the little bird's song seem plain tive. You could also say that there was plaintiveness in that bird's song. Don't confuse plaintive with plaintiff. A plaintiff is a person who takes someone to court—who makes a legal complaint.

PLATITUDE

PLATITUDE (PLAT uh tood) n a dull or trite remark; a cliché •The principal thinks he is a great orator, but his loud, boring speech was full of platitudes. •Instead of giving us any real insight into the situation, the lecturer threw platitudes at us for the entire period. It was a platitudinous speech.

PLETHORA

PLETHORA (PLETH ur uh) n an excess •We ate a plethora of candy on Halloween and a plethora of turkey on Thanks giv ing. •Letting the air force use our backyard as a bombing range created a plethora of problems.

POIGNANT

POIGNANT (POYN yunt) adj painfully emotional; extremely moving; sharp or astute The words poignant and pointed are very closely related, and they share much of the same range of meaning. A poi gnant scene is one that is so emotional or moving that it is almost painful to watch.

PONDEROUS

PONDEROUS (PAHN dur us) adj so large as to be clumsy; massive; dull •The wedding cake was a ponderous blob of icing and jelly beans. •The chairman, as usual, gave a pon der ous speech that left half his lis ten ers snoring in their plates.

PORTENT

PORTENT (POR tent) n an omen; a sign of something com ing in the future •The distant rumbling we heard this morning was a portent of the thun der storm that hit our area this afternoon. •Stock market investors looked for portents in their com pli cat ed charts and graphs; they hoped that the market's past behav ior would give them clues as to what would happen in the fu ture. Portentous (por TENT uhs) is the adjective form of portent, mean ing om i nous or filled with portent. But it is very often used to mean pompous, or self-consciously serious or ominous sounding. It can also mean amaz ing or prodigious. A por ten tous speech is not one that you would enjoy listening to. A portentous announcement might be one that tried to create an in ap pro pri ate sense of alarm in those listening to it. Portentous can also mean amazing or astonishing. A por ten tous sunset might be a remarkably glorious one rather than an ominous or menacing one.

POSTULATE

POSTULATE (PAHS chuh lut) n something accepted as true without proof; an ax i om A postulate is taken to be true because it is convenient to do so. • We might be able to prove a postulate if we had the time, but not now. A theorem is something that is proven using pos tu lates. Postulate (PAHS chuh layt) can be used as a verb, too. • Sherlock Holmes rarely postulated things, waiting for ev i dence before he made up his mind.

PRAGMATIC

PRAGMATIC (prag MAT ik) adj practical; down to earth; based on ex pe ri ence rather than theory A pragmatic person is one who deals with things as they are rather than as they might be or should be. • Erecting a gigantic dome of gold over our house would have been the ideal solution to the leak in our roof, but the small size of our bank account forced us to be pragmatic; we patched the hole with a dab of tar instead. Pragmatism (PRAG muh tiz um) is the belief or philosophy that the value or truth of something can be measured by its practical con se quenc es.

PRECEDENT

PRECEDENT (PRES uh dunt) n an earlier example or model of some thing Precedent is a noun form of the verb to precede, or go be fore. To set a precedent is to do something that sets an ex am ple for what may follow. • Last year's million-dollar prom set a precedent that the current student council hopes will not be followed in the future. That is, the student council hopes that future proms won't cost a million dollars. To be unprecedented is to have no precedent, to be something en tire ly new. • Urvashi's consumption of 10,677 hot dogs was un prec e dent ed; no one had ever eaten so many hot dogs before.

PRECIPITATE

PRECIPITATE (pri SIP uh tayt) v to cause to happen abrupt ly •A panic among investors precipitated last Mon day's crisis in the stock market. •The police were afraid that arresting the angry protestors might pre cip i tate a riot. Precipitate (pri SIP uh tit) can also be an adjective, meaning unwise ly hasty or rash. A precipitate decision is one made without enough thought be fore hand. • The guidance counselor, we thought, was precipitate when he had the tenth grader committed to a mental hospital for say ing that home work was boring.

PRECIPITOUS

PRECIPITOUS (pri SIP uh tus) adj steep Precipitous means like a precipice, or cliff. It and precipitate are closely related, as you probably guessed. But they don't mean the same thing, even though precipitous is often used loosely to mean the same thing as precipitate. A mountain can be precipitous, meaning either that it is steep or that it comprises lots of steep cliffs. Precipitous can also be used to signify things that are only fig-u ra tive ly steep. For example, you could say that someone had stum bled down a precipitous slope into drug addiction.

PRECLUDE

PRECLUDE (pri KLOOD) v to prevent something from ever happening • Ann feared that her abysmal academic career might preclude her becoming a brain surgeon.

PREDILECTION

PREDILECTION (pred uh LEK shun) n a natural pref er ence for some thing •The impatient judge had a predilection for well-prepared lawyers who said what they meant and didn't waste his time. •Joe's predilection for saturated fats has added roughly a foot to his waist line in the past twenty years.

PREEMINENT

PREEMINENT (pree EM uh nunt) adj better than anyone else; out stand ing; su preme •The nation's preeminent harpsichordist would be the best harpsi chord ist in the nation. •The Nobel Prize-winning physicist was preeminent in his field but he was still a lousy teacher.

PREEMPT

PREEMPT (pree EMPT) v to seize something by prior right When television show A preempts television show B, tele vi sion show A is shown at the time usually reserved for tele vi sion show B. The word pre empt implies that television show A is more im por tant than television show B and thus has a greater right to the time slot. A preemptive action is one that is undertaken in order to prevent some other action from being undertaken. • When the air force launched a pre emp tive strike against the missile base, the air force was at tack ing the missiles in order to prevent the missiles from attacking the air force.

PREMISE

PREMISE (PREM is) n an assumption; the basis for a con clu sion •In deciding to eat all the ice cream in the freezer, my premise was that if I didn't do it, you would. •Based on the premise that two wrongs don't make a right, I forgave him for insulting me rather than calling him a nasty name.

PREPOSSESS

PREPOSSESS (pree puh ZES) v to preoccupy; to influence be fore hand or prej u dice; to make a good impression on be fore hand This word has several common meanings. Be careful. When a person is prepossessed by an idea, he or she can't get it out of his or her mind. •My dream of producing energy from old chewing-gum wrappers pre pos sessed me, and I lost my job, my home, my wife, and my children. •Experience had prepossessed Larry's mother not to believe him when he said that someone else had broken the win dow; Larry had broken it every other time, so she assumed that he had broken it this time. •The new girl in the class was extremely prepossessing. The minute she walked into the room, her classmates rushed over to introduce themselves. Unprepossessing means unimpressive, but the word is only mild ly negative. • The quaint farmhouse had an unprepossessing ex te ri or, but a beau ti ful interior. Who would have imagined?

PREROGATIVE

PREROGATIVE (pri RAHG uh tiv) n a right or privilege con nect ed ex clu sive ly with a po si tion, a person, a class, a nation, or some other group or clas si fi ca tion •Giving traffic tickets to people he didn't like was one of the pre rog a tives of Junior's job as a policeman. •Sentencing people to death is a prerogative of many kings and queens. •Big mansions and fancy cars are among the prerogatives of wealth.

PREVAIL

PREVAIL (pri VAYL) v to triumph; to overcome rivals; (with on, upon, or with) to persuade When justice prevails, it means that good defeats evil. •The prosecutor prevailed in the murder trial; the defendant was found guilty. •My mother prevailed on me to make my bed. She told me she would punish me if I didn't, so I did. The adjective pre vail ing means most frequent or predominant. The pre vail ing opinion on a topic is the one that most people hold. If the pre vail ing winds are out of the north, then the wind is out of the north most of the time. A prevailing theory is the one most widely held at the time. It is prevalent (PREV uh lunt).

PRISTINE

PRISTINE (PRIS teen) adj original; unspoiled; pure An antique in pristine condition is one that hasn't been tam pered with over the years. It's still in its original con di tion. A pristine mountain stream is a stream that hasn't been pollut ed.

PRODIGAL

PRODIGAL (PRAHD uh gul) adj wastefully extravagant •The chef was prodigal with his employer's money, spending thou sands of dollars on ingredients for what was supposed to be a simple meal. •The young artist was prodigal with his talents: He wasted time and energy on greeting cards that might have been devoted to serious paint ings. •The prodigal gambler soon found that he couldn't afford even a two-dollar bet. To be prodigal is to be characterized by prodigality.

PRODIGIOUS

PRODIGIOUS (pruh DIJ us) adj extraordinary; enormous •To fill the Grand Canyon with Ping-Pong balls would be a pro di gious undertaking; it would be both extraordinary and enor mous. •The little boy caught a prodigious fish—it was ten times his size and might more easily have caught him had their sit u a tions been reversed.

PROFESS

PROFESS (pruh FES) v to declare; to declare falsely or pre tend •Jason professed to have taught himself calculus. •No one in our town was fooled by the candidate's professed love for llama farmers; everyone knew he was just trying to win votes from the pro-llama faction.

PROFICIENT

PROFICIENT (pruh FISH unt) adj thoroughly competent; skillful; good (at some thing) •Lillian was a proficient cabinetmaker. She could make a cab-i net that would make you sit back and say, "Now, there's a cab i net." •I fiddled around at the piano for many years but never became pro fi cient at playing. •Lucy was merely competent, but Molly was proficient at plucking ca nar ies. Proficiency is the state of being proficient.

PROFUSE

PROFUSE (pruh FYOOS) adj flowing; extravagant •When we gave Marian our house, our car, and all our clothes, her gratitude was profuse. •My teacher said I had done a good job, but his praise was far from profuse. I got the feeling he hadn't really liked my epic poem about two dinosaurs who fall in love just before they become extinct. •The grieving widow's tears were profuse. She had tears in pro fu sion.

PROLIFERATE

PROLIFERATE (proh LIF uh rayt) v to spread or grow rap id ly •Honey bees proliferated when we filled our yard with flow er ing plants. •Coughs and colds proliferate when groups of children are cooped up together during the winter. •The police didn't know what to make of the proliferation of coun ter feit money in the north end of town.

PROLIFIC

PROLIFIC (proh LIF ik) adj abundantly productive; fruitful or fertile A prolific writer is a writer who writes a lot of books. A prolific artist is an artist who paints a lot of pictures. • The old man had been extraordinarily prolific; he had thirty chil dren and more than one hundred grandchildren.

PROMULGATE

PROMULGATE (PRAHM ul gayt) v to proclaim; to publicly or for mal ly de clare something • The principal promulgated a new dress code over the loud speak er sys tem: Red, green, yellow, and blue were the only per mis si ble ar ti fi cial hair col ors.

PROPENSITY

PROPENSITY (pruh PEN suh tee) n a natural inclination or tendency; a pre di lec tion •Jessie has a propensity for saying stupid things: Every time she opens her mouth, something stupid comes out. •Edwin's propensity to sit around all day doing nothing came into conflict with his mother's propensity to kick him out of the house.

PROPITIOUS

PROPITIOUS (pruh PISH us) adj marked by favorable signs or con di tions •Rush hour is not a propitious time to drive into the city. •The early negotiations between the union and the company had been so propitious that no one was surprised when a new contract was an nounced well before the strike deadline.

PROPONENT

PROPONENT (pruh POH nunt) n an advocate; a supporter of a position Proponent and opponent are antonyms. • The proponents of a tax increase will probably not be re-elected next fall.

PROPRIETY

PROPRIETY (pruh PRYE uh tee) n properness; good manners •The old lady viewed the little girl's failure to curtsy as a flagrant breach of propriety. She did not approve of or coun te nance such im pro pri eties. •Propriety prevented the young man from trashing the town in cel e bra tion of his unexpected acceptance by the college of his choice. Propriety derives from proper, not property, and should not be confused with proprietary.

PROSAIC

PROSAIC (proh ZAY ik) adj dull; unimaginative; like prose (as op posed to poetry) •His description of the battle was so prosaic that it was hard for his listeners to believe that any of the soldiers had even been wounded, much less blown to smithereens. •The little boy's ambitions were all prosaic: He said h

PROSCRIBE

PROSCRIBE (proh SKRYBE) v to outlaw; to prohibit •Spitting on the sidewalk and shooting at road signs were both pro scribed activities under the new administration. •The young doctor proscribed smoking in the waiting room of his office. The act of proscribing is proscription; an individual act of pro scrib ing is also a proscription.

PROSELYTIZE

PROSELYTIZE (PRAHS uh luh tyze) v to convert (someone) from one reli gion or doctrine to another; to recruit converts to a religion or doctrine •The former Methodist had been proselytized by a Lutheran deacon. •The airport terminal was filled with proselytizers from a dozen different sects, cults, and religions. They were at tempt ing to pros e ly tize the pas sen gers walking through the terminal.

PROTRACT

PROTRACT (proh TRAKT) v to prolong •The trial was so protracted that one of the jurors died of old age and another gave birth. •The commencement speaker promised not to protract his remarks, but then he spoke for two solid hours. It was a pro tract ed speech.

PROVIDENT

PROVIDENT (PRAHV uh dunt) adj preparing for the future; providing for the future; frugal •We were provident with our limited food supplies, knowing that the winter ahead would be long and cold. •The provident father had long ago set aside money for the college education of each of his children. To be improvident is to fail to provide for the future. • It was im prov i dent of the grasshopper not to store any food for the winter, unlike his ac quain tance the provident ant.

PROVINCIAL

PROVINCIAL (pruh VIN shul) adj limited in outlook to one's own small corner of the world; narrow •The farmers were provincial; they had no opinions about anything but the price of corn and no interest in any thing except growing more of it. •New Yorkers have rep u ta tions for being sophisticated and cosmo pol i tan, but most of them are actually pro vin cial; they act as though nothing of interest had ever happened west of the Hudson River.

PROVISIONAL

PROVISIONAL (pruh VIZH uh nul) adj conditional; tem po rary; ten ta tive •Louis had been accepted as a provisional member of the club. He wouldn't become a permanent member until the other members had had a chance to see what he was really like. •The old man's offer to donate $10,000 to the charity was pro vi sion al; he said that he would give the money only if the charity could manage to raise a matching sum.

PURPORTED

PURPORTED (pur PORT id) adj rumored; claimed • The heiress is purported to have been kidnapped by ad ven tur ers and buried in a concrete vault beneath the busiest in ter sec tion in Times Square. No one believes this story except the psychic who was con sult ed by the police. To purport something is to claim or allege it.

PUTATIVE

PUTATIVE (PYOO tuh tiv) adj commonly accepted; sup posed; re put ed • The putative reason for placing the monument downtown is that no body had wanted it uptown. When you use the word putative, you em pha size that the reason is only supposed, not proven.

REPREHENSIBLE

REPREHENSIBLE (rep ri HEN suh bul) adj worthy of severe blame or cen sure •He put the cat in the laundry chute, tied the dog to the chim ney, and committed several other reprehensible acts. •Malcolm's manners were reprehensible: He ate his soup by drink ing it from his empty wineglass and flipped his peas into his mouth with the back of his salad fork.

QUALIFY

QUALIFY (KWAHL uh fye) v to modify or restrict You already know the primary meaning of qualify. Here's an oth er mean ing. •Susan qualified her praise of Judith by saying that her kind words ap plied only to Judith's skillful cooking and not to her abhorrent per son al i ty. Judith was upset by Susan's qual i fi c-a tion. •The library trustees rated their fund-raiser a qualified success; many more people than expected had come, but virtually no money had been raised. An unqualified success is a complete, unrestricted success.

QUERULOUS

QUERULOUS (KWER uh lus) adj complaining; grumbling; whining Although a query is a question, querulous does not mean questioning. •The exasperated mother finally managed to hush her querulous child. •The querulous voices of the stu dents, who believed that their quizzes had been graded too harshly, could be heard all the way at the other end of the school building.

QUIXOTIC

QUIXOTIC (kwik SAHT ik) adj romantic or idealistic to a foolish or imprac ti cal degree The word quixotic is derived from the name of Don Quixote, the pro tag o nist of Miguel de Cervantes's classic seventeenth-century nov el. Don Quixote had read so many romances about the golden age of chivalry that he set out to become a knight himself and have chiv al rous adventures. Instead, his romantic idealism almost in vari ably got him into trouble. To be quixotic is to be as foolish or impractical as Don Quixote in pursuing an ideal. •For many years Mr. Morris had led a quixotic effort to repeal the federal income tax. •The political organization had once been a powerful force in Wash ing ton, but its membership had dwindled, and its causes had be come in creas ing ly quixotic.

RAMIFICATION

RAMIFICATION (ram uh fuh KAY shun) n a consequence; a branch ing out A tree could be said to ramify, or branch out, as it grows. A ram i fi ca tion is a consequence that grows out of something in the same way that a tree branch grows out of a tree trunk. • The professor found a solution to the problem, but there are many ram i fi ca tions; some experts are afraid that he has created more prob lems than he has solved.

RAPACIOUS

RAPACIOUS (ruh PAY shus) adj greedy; plundering; av a ri cious • Wall Street investment bankers are often accused of being ra pa cious, but they claim they are performing a valuable eco nom ic func tion. The noun form is rapacity (ruh PAS uh tee).

REBUKE

REBUKE (ri BYOOK) v to criticize sharply • We trembled as Mr. Solomon rebuked us for flipping over his car and taking off the tires. A piece of sharp criticism is called a rebuke. • When the students got caught cheating on their French test, the prin ci pal de liv ered a rebuke that made their ears twirl.

REBUT

REBUT (ri BUT) v to contradict; to argue in opposition to; to prove to be false •They all thought I was crazy, but none of them could rebut my ar gu ment. •The defense attorney attempted to rebut the prosecutor's claim that the defendant's fingerprints, hair, clothing, signature, wallet, wrist watch, cred it cards, and car had been found at the scene of the crime. An act or instance of rebutting is called a rebuttal. Rebut and refute are synonyms.

RECALCITRANT

RECALCITRANT (ri KAL suh trunt) adj stubbornly defiant of authority or con trol; dis obe di ent •The recalcitrant cancer continued to spread through the patient's body despite every therapy and treatment the doc tors tried. •The country was in turmoil, but the recalcitrant dictator refused even to listen to the pleas of the international rep resen ta tives.

STRINGENT

STRINGENT (STRIN junt) adj strict; restrictive • The restaurant's stringent dress code required diners to wear paper hats, army boots, and battery-operated twirling bow ties. • The IRS accountant was quite stringent in his interpretation of the tax code; he disallowed virtually all of Leslie's de duc tions.

RECANT

RECANT (ri KANT) v to publicly take back and deny (some thing previously said or believed); to openly confess error •The chagrined scientist recanted his theory that mice orig i nat ed on the moon; it turned out that he had simply mixed up the results of two separate experiments. •The secret police tortured the intellectual for a week, by tickling his feet with a feather duster, until he finally recanted. An act of recanting is called a recantation.

RECLUSIVE

RECLUSIVE (ri KLOOS iv) adj hermitlike; withdrawn from society •The crazy millionaire led a reclusive existence, shutting him self up in his labyrinthine mansion and never setting foot in the outside world. •Our new neighbors were so re clu sive that we didn't even meet them until a full year after they had moved in. A reclusive person is a recluse. • After his wife's death, the griev ing old man turned into a recluse and seldom ventured out of his house. Emily Dickinson, one of Amer i ca's most creative poets, became a recluse (REK loos) after her father's death in 1874—she kept in contact with friends and family through cards and letters.

RECONDITE

RECONDITE (REK un dyte) adj hard to understand; over one's head •The philosopher's thesis was so recondite that I couldn't get past the first two sentences. •Every now and then the pro fes sor would lift his head from his desk and deliver some recondite pronouncement that left us scratch ing our heads and trying to figure out what he meant. •The scholarly jour nal was so recondite as to be utterly in com pre hen si ble.

REDOLENT

REDOLENT (RED uh lunt) adj fragrant •The air in autumn is redolent of wood smoke and fallen leaves. •The flower arrangements on the tables were both beautiful and red o lent. Something that is redolent has red o lence. Redolent also means sugges tive. • The new play was redolent of one I had seen many years ago.

REFUTE

REFUTE (ri FYOOT) v to prove to be false; to disprove •His expensive suit and imported shoes clearly refuted his claim that he was poor. •I refuted Billy's mathematical proof by showing him that it depend ed on two and two adding up to five. An act of refuting is called a refutation. • The audience enjoyed the panelist's humorous refutation of the main speak er's theory about the possibility of building an anti gravity air plane. Something that is indubitable, something that cannot be disproven, is ir re fut able. • Claudia's experiments with jelly beans and pencil erasers offered ir re fut able proof that jelly beans taste better than pencil erasers.

REITERATE

REITERATE (ree IT uh rayt) v to say again; to repeat •The candidate had reiterated his position so many times on the cam paign trail that he sometimes even muttered it in his sleep. •To reiterate, let me say once again that I am happy to have been invited to the birthday celebration of your adorable Peking ese. An act of reiterating is called a reiteration.

RELEGATE

RELEGATE (REL uh gayt) v to banish; to send away •The most junior of the junior executives was relegated to a tiny, win dow less office that had once been a broom closet. •The new dad's large collection of jazz records was rel e gat ed to the cellar to make room for the new baby's larger collection of stuffed animals. The father objected to the relegation of his record collection to the cellar, but his ob jec tion did no good.

RELENTLESS

RELENTLESS (ri LENT lis) adj continuous; unstoppable To relent is to stop or give up. Relentless, or unrelenting, means not stop ping. •The insatiable rabbit was relentless; it ate and ate until noth ing was left in the botanical garden. •The torrential rains were re lent less, even tu al ly cre at ing a del uge.

RELINQUISH

RELINQUISH (ri LING kwish) v to release or let go of; to surrender; to stop doing •The hungry dog refused to relinquish the enormous beef bone that he had stolen from the butcher's shop. •The retiring president relinquished control of the company only with the greatest reluctance. •Sandra was ninety-five years old before she finally re lin quished her view of herself as a glamorous teenaged beauty.

REMONSTRATE

REMONSTRATE (ri MAHN strayt) v to argue against; to protest; to raise ob jec tions •My boss remonstrated with me for telling all the secretaries they could take off the rest of the week. •The manager remon strat ed, but the umpire continued to insist that the base runner had been out at third. When the manager con tin ued to re mon strate, the umpire threw him out of the game. An act of remonstrating is a remonstration.

RENAISSANCE

RENAISSANCE (REN uh sahns) n a rebirth or revival The capitalized R Renaissance was a great blossoming of art, liter a ture, sci ence, and culture in general that transformed Europe between the four teenth and seventeenth centuries. The word is also used in con nec tion with lesser rebirths. •The declining neighborhood underwent a renaissance when a group of in ves tors bought several crumbling tenements and turned them into at trac tive apartment buildings. •The small college's football team had endured many losing sea sons but underwent a dramatic renaissance when the new coach recruited half-a-dozen 400-pound freshmen. Renaissance can also be spelled renascence (ri NAY suns).

REPARATION

REPARATION (rep uh RAY shun) n paying back; making amends; com pen sa tion To make a reparation is to repair some damage that has oc curred. This word is often used in the plural. •The defeated country de mand ed reparations for the de struc tion it had suffered at the hands of the victorious army. •After the ac ci dent we sought reparation in court, but our law yer was not competent and we didn't win a cent. Something that cannot be repaired is irreparable (i REP uh ruh bul). Note carefully the pronunciation of these words.

REPLENISH

REPLENISH (ri PLEN ish) v to fill again; to resupply; to restore •The manager of the hardware store needed to re plen ish his stock; quite a few of the shelves were empty. •The commanding general replenished his army with a trainload of food and other supplies. •After the big Thanksgiving meal, everyone felt replenished. An act of replenishing is a re plen ish ment.

REPLETE

REPLETE (ri PLEET) adj completely filled; abounding •The once-polluted stream was now replete with fish of every de scrip tion. •The bride wore a magnificent sombrero replete with fuzzy dice and cam paign buttons. •Tim ate all nine courses at the wedding banquet. He was filled to the point of repletion

REPROACH

REPROACH (ri PROHCH) v to scold, usually in dis ap point ment; to blame; to dis grace • The police officer reproached me for leaving my car parked over night in a no-standing zone. Reproach can also be a noun. To look at someone with re proach is to look at that person critically or accusingly. To be filled with self-reproach can mean to be ashamed. Impeccable behavior that's beyond fault is irreproachable. • Even though Jerome did hit Mabel on the head, his motive was ir re proach able: He had merely been trying to kill a fly perched on her hairnet.

RESOLUTE

RESOLUTE (REZ uh loot) adj determined; firm; unwavering •Uncle Ted was resolute in his decision not to have a good time at our Christmas party; he stood alone in the corner and muttered to himself all night long. •The other team was strong, but our players were resolute. They kept pushing and shoving until, in the final moments, they won the roller-derby tournament. Someone who sticks to his New Year's resolution is resolute. Res o lute and resolved are synonyms. To be irresolute is to be wavering or indecisive. • Our irresolute lead er led us first one way and then the other way in the process of getting us thoroughly and completely lost.

RESPITE

RESPITE (RES pit) n a period of rest or relief •We worked without respite from five in the morning until five in the afternoon. •The new mother fell asleep when her baby stopped crying, but the respite was brief; the baby started up again almost im me di ate ly.

RETICENT

RETICENT (RET uh sint) adj quiet; restrained; reluctant to speak, es pe cial ly about one self •Luther's natural reticence made him an ideal speaker: His speech es never lasted more than a few minutes. •Kaynard was reticent on the subject of his accomplishments; he didn't like to talk about himself. To be reticent is to be characterized by reticence.

REVERE

REVERE (ri VEER) v to respect highly; to honor • Einstein was a preeminent scientist who was revered by every one, even his rivals. Einstein enjoyed nearly universal rever ence (REV uh rins). To be irreverent is to be mildly disrespectful. • Peter made jokes about his younger sister's painting. She was per turbed at his ir rev er ence and began to cry.

RHETORIC

RHETORIC (RET ur ik) n the art of formal speaking or writ ing; in flat ed discourse A talented public speaker might be said to be skilled in rhet o ric. The word is often used in a pejorative sense to describe speaking or writing that is skillfully executed but insincere or devoid of meaning. A political candidate's speech that was long on drama and prom-is es but short on genuine substance might be dismissed as "mere rhetoric." To use rhetoric is to be rhetorical (ruh TOR ik uhl). A rhe tor i cal ques tion is one the speaker intends to answer himself or her self— that is, a ques tion asked only for rhetorical effect.

RIGOROUS

RIGOROUS (RIG ur us) adj strict; harsh; severe To be rigorous is to act with rigor. •Our exercise program was rigorous but effective; after just a few months, our eighteen hours of daily exercise had begun to pay off. •The professor was popular largely because he wasn't rig or ous; there were no tests in his course and only one paper, which was optional.

ROGUE

ROGUE (rohg) n a criminally dishonest person; a scoundrel A rogue is someone who can't be trusted. This word is often used, how ev er, to characterize a playfully mis chie vous person. • Huckleberry Finn is a bit of a rogue; while his actions are technically criminal, he performs them with noble intentions and a humorous spirit.

RUMINATE

RUMINATE (ROO muh nayt) v to contemplate; to ponder; to mull over Ruminate comes from a Latin word meaning to chew cud. Cows, sheep, and other cud-chewing animals are called ru mi nants. To ru mi nate is to quietly chew on or ponder your own thoughts. • The teacher's comment about the causes of weather set me to ru mi nat ing about what a nice day it was and to wishing that I were outside.

SACCHARINE

SACCHARINE (SAK uh rin) adj sweet; excessively or dis gust ing ly sweet Saccharin is a calorie-free sweetener; saccharine means sweet. Ex cept for the spelling, this is one of the easiest-to-remember words there is. Saccharine can be applied to things that are literally sweet, such as sugar, saccharin, fruit, and so on. It can also be applied to things that are sweet in a figurative sense, such as children, per son al i ties, and sen ti ments—especially things that are too sweet, or sweet in a sick en ing way. •We wanted to find a nice card for Uncle Mo, but the cards in the display at the drugstore all had such saccharine mes sag es that we would have been too embarrassed to send any of them. •The love story was so saccharine that I vowed never to see another sappy, predictable movie again.

STYMIE

STYMIE (STYE mee) v to thwart; to get in the way of; to hinder Stymie is a golfing term. A golfer is stymied when another play er's ball lies on the direct path between his or her own ball and the cup. Off the golf course, one might be stymied by one's boss. • In my effort to make a name for myself in the company, I was stymied by my boss, who always managed to take credit for all the good things I did and to blame me for his mistakes.

STRICTURE

STRICTURE (STRIK chur) n a restriction; a limitation; a neg a tive crit i cism •Despite the strictures of apartment living, we enjoyed the eight years we spent in New York City. •The unfavorable lease placed many strictures on how the building could be used. •The poorly prepared violinist went home trembling after his con cert to await the inevitable strictures of the reviewers.

SAGACIOUS

SAGACIOUS (suh GAY shus) adj discerning; shrewd; keen in judg ment; wise •Edgar's decision to move the chickens into the barn turned out to be sagacious; about an hour later, the hailstorm hit. •The announcer's sagacious commentary made the baseball game seem vastly more profound than we had expected it to be. To be sagacious is to have sagacity (suh GAS uh tee). A similar word is sage, which means wise, possessing wisdom derived from ex pe ri ence or learning. •When we were contemplating starting our own popcorn business, we received some sage advice from a man who had lost all his money selling candied apples. •The professor's critique, which comprised a few sage comments, sent me back to my room feeling pretty stupid. Sage can also be a noun. A wise person, especially a wise old person, is often called a sage.

SALIENT

SALIENT (SAYL yunt) adj sticking out; conspicuous; leaping A salient characteristic is one that leaps right out at you. • Ursula had a number of salient features including, primarily, her nose, which stuck out so far that she was constantly in danger of slamming it in doors and windows.

SALUTARY

SALUTARY (SAL yuh ter ee) adj healthful; remedial; cur a tive •Lowered blood pressure is among the salutary effects of exercise. •The long sea voyage was salutary; when Elizabeth landed she looked ten years younger than she had when she set sail.

SANGUINE

SANGUINE (SANG gwin) adj cheerful; optimistic; hopeful •Miguel was sanguine about his chances of winning the Nobel Peace Prize, even though, as an eighth grader, he hadn't really done anything to deserve it. •The ebullient checkers champion remained sanguine in defeat; he was so sure of himself that he viewed even ca tas tro phe as merely a tem po rary setback. Don't confuse sanguine (a nice word) with sanguinary (not a nice word). Sanguinary means bloodthirsty.

SARDONIC

SARDONIC (sahr DAHN ik) adj mocking; scornful •Isabella's weak attempts at humor were met by nothing but a few scat tered pockets of sardonic laughter. •Even George's friends found him excessively sardonic; he couldn't dis cuss anything without mocking it, and there was almost nothing about which he could bring himself to say two nice words in a row.

SCINTILLATE

SCINTILLATE (SIN tuh layt) v to sparkle, either literally or fig u ra tive ly •Stars and diamonds scintillate—so do witty comments, charming per son al i ties, and anything else that can be said to sparkle. •Stefan was a quiet drudge at home, but at a party he could be ab so lute ly scintillating, tossing off witty remarks and charm ing ev ery one in the room. •Benny's grades last term weren't scintillating, to put it mild ly; he had four Ds and an F. The act of scintillating is called scintillation.

SCRUPULOUS

SCRUPULOUS (SKROO pyuh lus) adj strict; careful; hesitant for eth i cal reasons •Leela was scrupulous in keeping her accounts; she knew where every penny came from and where every penny went. •We tried to be scrupulous about not dripping paint, but by the time the day was over there was nearly as much paint on the floor as there was on the walls. •Philip was too scrupulous to make a good used-car dealer; every time he started to lie, he was overcome by ethical doubts. A scruple is a qualm or moral doubt. To have no scruples—to be un scru pu lous—is to have no conscience.

SCRUTINIZE

SCRUTINIZE (SKROOT uh nyze) v to examine very care ful ly •I scrutinized the card catalog at the library but couldn't find a single book on the topic I had chosen for my term paper. •The rocket scientists scrutinized thousands of pages of com put er print outs, looking for a clue to why the rocket had ex plod ed. •My mother scrutinized my clothes and my appearance before I left for the evening, but even after several minutes of careful analysis she was unable to find anything to complain about. To scrutinize something is to subject it to scrutiny. • The clever forgery fooled the museum curator but did not withstand the scrutiny of the ex perts; after studying for sev er al weeks, the ex perts pro nounced the painting to be a fake. Something that cannot be examined is inscrutable. In scru ta ble means mys te ri ous, impossible to understand. • We had no idea what Bill was thinking, because his smile was inscru ta ble. Poker players try to be inscrutable to their op po nents.

SEDITION

SEDITION (si DISH un) n treason; the incitement of public dis or der or rebellion • The political group was charged with sedition because it had ad vo cat ed burning the capital to the ground.

SENSORY

SENSORY (SEN suh ree) adj having to do with the senses or sen sa tion • Babies enjoy bright colors, moving objects, pleasant sounds, and other forms of sensory stimulation. Your ears, eyes, and tongue are all sensory organs. It is through them that your senses operate. Extrasensory perception is the supposed ability of some people to perceive things without using the standard senses of sight, hearing, smell, touch, or taste. Two similar-sounding and often confusing words are sen su al and sen su ous. To be sensual is to be devoted to grat i fy ing one's senses through physical pleasure, especially sexual pleasure; to be sensuous is to delight the senses. A sensual person is one who eagerly indulges his or her phys i cal desires. A sensuous person is one who stimulates the senses of others.

SENTIENT

SENTIENT (SEN shunt) adj able to perceive by the senses; conscious Human beings are sentient. Rocks are not. Note carefully the pronunciation of this word. • While trees are not, strictly speaking, sentient beings, many credible people claim to have communicated with them.

SEQUESTER

SEQUESTER (si KWES tur) v to set or keep apart •Since much of the rest of the city had become a battle zone, the visiting entertainers were sequestered in the in ter na tion al ho tel. •The struggling writer sequestered himself in his study for sever al months, trying to produce the Great American Nov el. •Juries are sometimes sequestered during trials to prevent them from talk ing to people or reading newspapers.

SERENDIPITY

SERENDIPITY (ser un DIP uh tee) n accidental good for tune; dis cov er ing good things with out looking for them • It was serendipity rather than genius that led the archae ol o gist to his breathtaking discovery of the ancient civilization. While walking his dog in the desert, he tripped over the top of a buried tomb. Something that occurs through serendipity is serendipitous. • Our ar riv al at the airport serendipitously coincided with that of the queen, and she offered us a ride to our hotel in her car riage.

SERVILE

SERVILE (SUR vyle) adj submissive and subservient; like a ser vant •Cat lovers sometimes say that dogs are too servile; they follow their owners everywhere and slobber all over them at every op por tu ni ty. •The horrible boss demanded servility from his em ploy ees; when he said, "Jump!'' he expected them to ask, "How high?" A similar word is slavish (SLAY vish), which means even more subser vi ent than servile. Slavish devotion to a cause is de vo tion in spite of everything. An artist's slavish imitator would be an imitator who imitated everything about the artist.

SINISTER

SINISTER (SIN ih stur) adj evil, wicked; foreshadowing evil, trouble, or wickedness • The house on the hill is pretty by day, but at night it casts sinister shadows and emits frightening moans.

SLANDER

SLANDER (SLAN dur) v to speak badly about someone pub lic ly; to de fame; to spread malicious rumor • Jonathan slandered Mr. Perriwinkle by telling everyone in school that the principal was a thief; Mr. Perriwinkle resent ed this slan der. Since he was the principal, he expelled the slan der ous student.

SLOTH

SLOTH (slawth) n laziness; sluggishness You may have seen a picture of an animal called a sloth. It hangs upside down from tree limbs and is never in a hurry to do any thing. To fall into sloth is to act like a sloth. • Yusuke's weekends were devoted to sloth. He never arose before noon, and he seldom left the house before Monday morning. To be lazy and sluggish is to be slothful. • Ophelia's slothful husband virtually lived on the couch in the living room, and the television remote-control device was in danger of be com ing graft ed to his hand.

SOLICITOUS

SOLICITOUS (suh LIS uh tus) adj eager and attentive, often to the point of hov er ing; anxiously caring or attentive •Every time we turned around, we seemed to step on the foot of the solicitous salesman, who appeared to feel that if he left us alone for more than a few seconds, we would decide to leave the store. •When the sick movie star sneezed, half-a-dozen solicitous nurses came rushing into his hospital room. The noun is solicitude.

SOLVENT

SOLVENT (SAHL vunt) adj not broke or bankrupt; able to pay one's bills • Jerry didn't hope to become a millionaire; all he wanted to do was remain solvent. To be broke is to be insolvent. An insolvent company is one that can't cover its debts. The state of being solvent is called solvency; the state of being in sol vent is called insolvency.

SOPORIFIC

SOPORIFIC (sahp uh RIF ik) adj sleep inducing; bor ing; sleepy •The doctor calmed his hysterical patient by injecting him with some sort of soporific medication. •Sam's soporific address was acknowledged not by applause but by a cho rus of snores. •The soporific creature from the bottom of the sea lay in a gigan tic blob on the beach for several days and then roused itself enough to con sume the panic-stricken city.

SORDID

SORDID (SOR did) adj vile; filthy; squalid •The college roommates led a sordid existence, surrounded by dirty laundry, rotting garbage, and body odor. •The conspirators plotted their sordid schemes at a series of secret meet ings in an abandoned warehouse. •The leprosy blight had turned a once-pretty neighborhood into a sordid outpost of despair and crime. SQUALID = (of a place) extremely dirty and unpleasant, especially as a result of poverty or neglect. - showing or involving a contemptible lack of moral standards.

SPAWN

SPAWN (spawn) v to bring forth; to produce a large number • A best-selling book or blockbuster movie will spawn dozens of imitators.

SPECIOUS

SPECIOUS (SPEE shus) adj deceptively plausible or at trac tive •The charlatan's specious theories about curing baldness with used tea bags charmed the studio audience but did not convince the experts, who believed that fresh tea bags were more effective. •The river's beauty turned out to be specious; what had looked like churn ing rapids from a distance was, on closer inspection, some sort of foamy industrial waste. To be specious is to be characterized by speciousness. DECEPTIVELY = in a way or to an extent that gives a misleading impression.

SPURIOUS

SPURIOUS (SPYOOR ee us) adj false; fake An apocryphal story is one whose truth is uncertain. A spurious story, however, is out-and-out false, no doubt about it. • The political candidate attributed his loss to numerous spu ri ous rumors that had hounded him through out his campaign.

SQUALOR

SQUALOR (SKWAHL ur) n filth; wretched, degraded, or re pul sive liv ing con di tions • If people live in squalor for too long, the ruling elite can count on an insurgency.

SQUANDER

SQUANDER (SKWAHN dur) v to waste •Jerry failed to husband his inheritance; instead, he squan dered it on stuffed toys.

STAUNCH

STAUNCH (stawnch) adj firmly committed; firmly in favor of; steadfast A staunch Republican is someone who always votes for Re pub li can can di dates. A staunch supporter of tax reform would be someone who firmly believes in tax reform. To be staunch in your support of some thing is to be unshakable.

STEADFAST

STEADFAST (STED fast) adj loyal; faithful • Steadfast love is love that never wavers. To be steadfast in a rela tion ship is to be faithfully committed. To be steadfast is to be like a rock: un chang ing, unwavering, unmov ing.

STIGMATIZE

STIGMATIZE (STIG muh tyze) v to brand with disgrace; to set a mark of dis grace upon • Steve's jeans were Lee's instead of Levi's, and this mistake stig ma tized him for the rest of his high school career. A stigma is a mark of disgrace.

STIPULATE

STIPULATE (STIP yuh layt) v to require something as part of an agreement • You are well advised to stipulate the maximum amount you will pay in any car-repair contract. Guarantees often stipulate certain conditions that must be met if the guar an tee is to be valid.

STOIC

STOIC (STOH ik) adj indifferent (at least outwardly) to plea sure or pain, to joy or grief, to fortune or misfortune •Nina was stoic about the death of her canary; she went about her busi ness as though nothing sad had happened. •We tried to be stoic about our defeat, but as soon as we got into the locker room, we all began to cry and bang our fore heads on the floor.

STRATUM

STRATUM (STRAT um) n a layer; a level The middle class is one stratum of society. The plural of stratum is strata. A hierarchy is composed of stra ta. To stratify is to make into layers. This word can also be pronounced "STRAY tum."

SUBJUGATE

SUBJUGATE (SUB juh gayt) v to subdue and dominate; to enslave •I bought the fancy riding lawn mower because I thought it would make my life easier, but it quickly subjugated me; all sum mer long, it seems, I did nothing but change its oil, sharp en its blades, and drive it back and forth between my house and the repair shop. •The tyrant subjugated all the peasants living in the kingdom; once free, they were now forced to do his bidding.

SUBLIME

SUBLIME (suh BLYME) adj awesome; extremely exalted; lofty; ma jes tic •After winning $70 million in the lottery and quitting our jobs as sewer workers, our happiness was sublime. •Theodore was a sublime thinker; after pondering even a diffi cult prob lem for just a few minutes, he would invariably ar rive at a concise and elegant solution. •The soup at the restaurant was sublime. I've never tasted anything so good. The noun form of sublime is sublimity (suh BLIM i tee). Don't confuse sublime with subliminal (suh BLIM uh nuhl), which means sub con scious, or sub li mate, which means to suppress one's sub con scious mind.

SUBORDINATE

SUBORDINATE (suh BOR duh nit) adj lower in im por tance, po si tion, or rank; sec ond ary • My desire to sit on the couch and watch television all night long was subordinate to my desire to stand in the kitchen eat ing junk food all night long, so I did the latter instead of the former. A vice president is subordinate to a president. Subordinate (suh BOR duh nayt) can also be a verb. To sub or di nate some thing in relation to something else is to make it sec ond ary or less im por tant. To be insubordinate (in suh BOR duh nit) is not to ac knowl edge the authority of a superior. An army private who says, "Bug off!" when ordered to do something by a general is guilty of being insubordinate or of com mit ting an act of in sub or di na tion.

SUBSTANTIVE

SUBSTANTIVE (SUB stan tiv) adj having substance; real; es sen tial; sol id; sub stan tial •The differences between the two theories were not sub stan tive; in fact, the two theories said the same thing with different words. •The gossip columnist's wild accusations were not based on any thing sub stan tive; her source was a convicted perjurer, and she had made up all the quotations.

SUBTLE

SUBTLE (SUT ul) adj not obvious; able to make fine dis tinc tions; in ge nious; crafty •The alien beings had created a shrewd replica of Mr. Jenson, but his wife did notice a few subtle differences, in clud ing the fact that the new Mr. Jenson had no pulse. •Jim's subtle mind enables him to see past problems that con fuse the rest of us. •The burglar was subtle; he had come up with a plan that would enable him to steal all the money in the world without arousing the suspicions of the authorities.

SUBVERSIVE

SUBVERSIVE (sub VUR siv) adj corrupting; overthrowing; un der min ing; in sur gent •The political group destroyed the Pentagon's computer files, hi jacked Air Force One, and en gaged in various other subversive activities. •Madeline's efforts to teach her first-grade students to read were thwart ed by that most subversive of inventions, the television set.

SUCCUMB

SUCCUMB (suh KUM) v to yield or submit; to die •I had said I wasn't going to eat anything at the party, but when Ann held the tray of imported chocolates under my nose, I quickly suc cumbed and ate all of them. •The Martians in The War of the Worlds survived every mil i tary weap on known to man but succumbed to the com mon cold. •When Willard reached the age of 110, his family began to think that he would live forever, but he succumbed not long afterward.

SUPERCILIOUS

SUPERCILIOUS (soo pur SIL ee us) adj haughty; pa tron iz ing •The supercilious Rolls-Royce salesman treated us like peas ants until we opened our suitcase full of one-hundred-dollar bills. •The newly famous author was so supercilious that he pre tend ed not to recognize members of his own family, whom he now believed to be be neath him.

SURFEIT

SURFEIT (SUR fit) n excess; an excessive amount; excess or over in dul gence in eating or drinking Thanksgiving meals are usually a surfeit for everyone involved.

SURREPTITIOUS

SURREPTITIOUS (sur up TISH us) adj sneaky; secret •The dinner guest surreptitiously slipped a few silver spoons into his jacket as he was leaving the dining room. •The baby-sitter made herself a surreptitious meal of lobster as soon as Mr. and Mrs. Robinson had driven away.

SURROGATE

SURROGATE (SUR uh git) adj substitute A surrogate mother is a woman who bears a child for some one else. This word is often a noun. A surrogate is a substitute. • A kind parent offered to go to prison as a surrogate for his son, who had been convicted of extortion.

SYCOPHANT

SYCOPHANT (SIK uh funt) n one who sucks up to others • The French class seemed to be full of sycophants; the stu dents were always bringing apples to the teacher and telling her how nice she looked. A sycophant is sycophantic (sik uh FAN tik). • The exasperated boss fi nal ly fired his sy co phan tic secretary because he couldn't stand being around some one who never had anything nasty to say.

SYNTHESIS

SYNTHESIS (SIN thuh sis) n the combining of parts to form a whole •It seemed as though the meeting might end in acrimony and con fu sion until Raymond offered his brilliant synthesis of the two diverging points of view. •A hot fudge sundae is the perfect synthesis of hot fudge and vanilla ice cream.

TURPITUDE

TURPITUDE (TUR puh tood) n shameful wickedness; de prav i ty • Paul was sacked by his boss because of a flagrant act of turpi tude: He was caught stealing office supplies.

TACIT

TACIT (TAS it) adj implied; not spoken • Mrs. Rodgers never formally asked us to murder her husband, but we truly believed that we were acting with her tacit consent. Tacit is related to taciturn.

TACITURN

TACITURN (TAS i turn) adj untalkative by nature •The chairman was so taciturn that we often discovered that we had ab so lute ly no idea what he was thinking. •The taciturn physicist was sometimes thought to be brilliant sim ply be cause no one had ever heard him say anything stu pid. Everyone mis con strued his taciturnity; he was ac tu al ly quite stupid. Taciturn is related to tacit.

TANGENTIAL

TANGENTIAL (tan JEN shul) adj only superficially related to the mat ter at hand; not especially relevant; peripheral •The vice president's speech bore only a tangential rela tion ship to the topic that had been announced. •Stuart's connection with our organization is tangential; he once made a phone call from the lobby of our building, but he never worked here.

TANTAMOUNT

TANTAMOUNT (TAN tuh mownt) adj equivalent to •Waving a banner for the visiting team at that football game would be tantamount to committing suicide; the home-team fans would tear you apart in a minute. •Yvonne's method of soliciting donations from her employees was tan ta mount to extortion; she clearly implied that she would fire them if they didn't pitch in.

TAUTOLOGICAL

TAUTOLOGICAL (tawt uh LAH juh kul) adj redundant; cir cu lar "When everyone has a camera, cameras will be universal" is a tau to log i cal statement, because "everyone having a cam era" and "cam er as being uni ver sal" mean the same thing. • The testing company's definition of intelligence—"that which is mea sured by intelligence tests"—is tautological. A tautology (taw TAHL uh jee) is a needless repetition of words, or saying the same thing using different words. For example: • The trou ble with bach e lors is that they aren't married.

TEMERITY

TEMERITY (tuh MER uh tee) n boldness; recklessness; au dac i ty •Our waiter at the restaurant had the temerity to tell me he thought my table manners were atrocious. •The mountain climber had more temerity than skill or sense. He tried to climb a mountain that was much too difficult and ended up in a heap at the bottom.

TEMPERATE

TEMPERATE (TEM pur it) adj mild; moderate; restrained •Our climate is temperate during the spring and fall but nearly un bear able during the summer and winter. •The teacher's temperate personality lent a feeling of calm and control to the kindergarten class. The opposite of temperate is intemperate, which means not moder ate. • Becky's intemperate use of oreg a no ruined the chili. To temper something is to make it milder. • Anna laughed and shrieked so loudly at every joke that even the co me di an wished she would temper her appreciation. Temperance is moderation, especially with regard to alcoholic drinks.

TENABLE

TENABLE (TEN uh bul) adj defensible, as in one's position in an ar gu ment; ca pa ble of being argued successfully; valid • Members of the Flat Earth Society continue to argue that the earth is flat, although even children dismiss their arguments as untenable. Untenable means unable to be defended.

TENACIOUS

TENACIOUS (tuh NAY shus) adj persistent; stubborn; not let ting go •The foreign student's tenacious effort to learn English won him the ad mi ra tion of all the teachers at our school. •Louise's grasp of geometry was not tenacious. She could han dle the sim pler problems most of the time, but she fell apart on quizzes and tests. •The ivy growing on the side of our house was so tenacious that we had to tear the house down to get rid of it. To be tenacious is to have tenacity (tuh NAS us tee).

TENET

TENET (TEN it) n a shared principle or belief •The tenets of his religion prohibited him from dancing and going to movies. •One of the most important tenets of our form of government is that people can be trusted to govern themselves.

TENTATIVE

TENTATIVE (TEN tuh tiv) adj experimental; temporary; un cer tain •George made a tentative effort to paint his house by himself; he slapped some paint on the front door and his clothes, tipped over the bucket, and called a professional. •Our plans for the party are tentative at this point, but we are con sid er ing hiring a troupe of accordionists to play polkas while our guests are eating dessert. •Hugo believed himself to be a great wit, but his big joke was reward ed by nothing more than a very tentative chuckle from his audience.

TENUOUS

TENUOUS (TEN yoo us) adj flimsy; extremely thin • The organization's financial situation has always been ten u ous; the bal ance of the checking account is usually close to zero. To attenuate is to make thin. Extenuating circumstances are those that lessen the magnitude of something, especially a crime. • Cherrie admitted that she stole the Cracker Jacks, but claimed that there were extenuating circum stanc es: She had no money to buy food for her pet chameleon. FLIMSY = comparatively light and insubstantial; easily damaged.

TERSE

TERSE (turs) adj using no unnecessary words; succinct •The new recording secretary's minutes were so terse that they were oc ca sion al ly cryptic. •Terseness is not one of Rex's virtues; he would talk until the crack of dawn if someone didn't stop him.

TIRADE

TIRADE (TYE rayd) n a prolonged, bitter speech • Preston launched into a tirade against imitation cheese on the school lunch menu.

TORPOR

TORPOR (TOR pur) n sluggishness; inactivity; apathy •After consuming the guinea pig, the boa constrictor fell into a state of contented torpor that lasted several days. •The math teacher tried to reduce the torpor of his students by banging on his desk, but the students scarcely blinked. To be in a state of torpor is to be torpid.

TOUCHSTONE

TOUCHSTONE (TUCH stohn) n a standard; a test of au then tic i ty or quality •The size of a student's vocabulary is a useful touchstone for judg ing the quality of his or her education. •A candidate's pronouncements about the economy provided a touch stone by which his or her fitness for office could be judged. In its original usage, a touchstone was a dark stone against which gold and other precious metals were rubbed in order to test their purity. Now the word is used more loosely to describe a broad range of standards and tests.

TOUT

TOUT (towt) v to praise highly; to brag publicly about • Advertisements touted the chocolate-flavored toothpaste as getting rid of your sweet tooth while saving your teeth.

TRANSGRESS

TRANSGRESS (trans GRES) v to violate (a law); to sin •The other side had transgressed so many provisions of the trea ty that we had no choice but to go to war. •We tried as hard as we could not to transgress their elab o rate rules, but they had so many prohibitions that we couldn't keep track of all of them. An act of transgressing is a transgression. • The bully's in nu mer a ble trans gres sions included breaking all the win dows in the new gym na si um and pushing several first graders off the jungle gym.

TREPIDATION

TREPIDATION (trep uh DAY shun) n fear; apprehension; ner vous trembling •The nursery school students were filled with trepidation when they saw the other children in their class dressed in their Hallow een cos tumes. •The trepidation of the swimming team was readily apparent: Their knees were knocking as they lined up along the edge of the pool. To be fearless is to be intrepid. • The intrepid captain sailed his ship around the world with only a hand kerchief for a sail.

cower

To crouch or shrink away from in fear or shame

UBIQUITOUS

UBIQUITOUS (yoo BIK wuh tus) adj being everywhere at the same time •The new beer commercial was ubiquitous—it seemed to be on every tele vi sion channel at once. •Personal computers, once a rarity, have become ubiquitous. To be ubiquitous is to be characterized by ubiquity (yoo BIK wuh tee). The ubiq ui ty of fast-food restaurants is one of the more de press ing features of Amer i can culture.

UNCONSCIONABLE

UNCONSCIONABLE (un KAHN shuh nuh bul) adj not con trolled by conscience; un scru pu lous •Leaving a small child unattended all day long is an un con scio na ble act. •Robbing every citizen of that town was unconscionable. Bert should be ashamed of himself for doing it. Don't confuse this word with unconscious.

UNCTUOUS

UNCTUOUS (UNGK choo us) adj oily, both literally and fig u ra tive ly; in sin cere Salad oil is literally unctuous. A used-car salesman might be fig u ra tive ly unctuous—that is, oily in the sense of being slick, sleazy, and in sin cere.

UNREMITTING

UNREMITTING (un ri MIT ing) adj unceasing; unabated; re lent less • Superman waged an unremitting battle against evildoers ev ery where.

UNWITTING

UNWITTING (un WIT ing) adj unintentional; ignorant; not aware •When Leo agreed to hold open the door of the bank, he be came an un wit ting accomplice to the bank robbery. •My theft was unwitting; I hadn't meant to steal the car, but had absentmindedly driven it away from the automobile deal er ship and parked it in my garage. •On the camping trip, Josephine unwittingly stepped into a bear trap and remained stuck in it for several days.

URBANE

URBANE (ur BAYN) adj poised; sophisticated; refined •The British count was witty and urbane; all the hosts and hostess es wanted to have him at their parties. •The new magazine was far too urbane to appeal to a wide audi ence outside the big city. Urbanity (ur BAN uh tee) is a quality more often acquired in an urban setting than in a rural one.

USURP

USURP (yoo SURP) v to seize wrongfully •The children believed that their mother's new boyfriend had usurped their father's rightful place in their family. •The founder's scheming young nephew usurped a position of power in the company. The noun is usurpation (yoo sur PAY shun).

UTILITARIAN

UTILITARIAN (yoo til uh TAR ee un) adj stressing use ful ness or utility above all other qual i ties; pragmatic • Jason's interior-decorating philosophy was strictly util i tar i an; if an ob ject wasn't genuinely useful, he didn't want it in his home. Utilitarian can also be a noun. Jason, just aforementioned, could be called a utilitarian.

VERNACULAR

VERNACULAR (vur NAK yuh lur) n everyday speech; slang; idiom • Our teacher said that we should save our vernacular for the street; in the classroom we should use proper grammar.

VACILLATE

VACILLATE (VAS uh layt) v to be indecisive; to waver •We invited James to spend Thanksgiving with us, but he vac il lat ed for so long that we finally became annoyed and disinvited him. •Tyler vacillated about buying a new car. He couldn't decide wheth er to get one. The act of vacillating is called vacillation.

VAPID

VAPID (VAP id) adj without liveliness; dull; spiritless An apathetic person just doesn't care about anything, and ev ery thing he does is vapid. • The novelist's prose was so vapid that Mary couldn't get be yond the first page.

VEHEMENT

VEHEMENT (VEE uh munt) adj intense; forceful; violent • Shaking his fist and stomping his foot, Gerry was vehement in his denial. The noun is vehemence.

VENAL

VENAL (VEEN ul) adj capable of being bribed; willing to do any thing for money; corrupt •The venal judge reversed his favorable ruling when the de-fen dant refused to make good on his promised bribe. •The young man's interest in helping the sick old woman was strict ly venal; he figured that if he was kind to her, she would leave him a lot of money in her will. A venal person is a person characterized by venality (vee NAL uh tee). Don't confuse this word with venial (VEE nee ul), which means trivial or pardon able. A peccadillo is a venial, harmless sin.

VERBOSE

VERBOSE (vur BOHS) adj using too many words; not suc cinct; circumlocutory Someone who is verbose uses too many words when fewer words would suffice. • Lee handed in a 178-word final as sign ment; no one ever accused him of verbosity (vur BAHS uh tee).

VERISIMILITUDE

VERISIMILITUDE (ver uh si MIL uh tood) n similarity to reality; the appear ance of truth; looking like the real thing •They used pine cones and old truck tires to make statues of Hol ly wood celebrities that were remarkable for their veri si mil i tude. •The verisimilitude of counterfeit eleven-dollar bills did not fool the eagle-eyed treasury officer, who recognized them im me di ate ly for what they were.

VESTIGE

VESTIGE (VES tij) n a remaining bit of something; a last trace •The unhappy young man found vestiges of his fiancée in the rubble, but the explosion had effectively ended their romance. •An old uniform and a tattered scrapbook were the only ves tig es of the old man's career as a professional athlete. Your appendix is a vestige: It used to have a function, but now this organ does nothing. The adjective form of vestige is vestigial (vuh STIJ ee ul). The appen dix is referred to as a vestigial organ. It is still in our bodies, al though it no longer has a function. It is a mere vestige of some function our digestive systems no longer perform. Note carefully the pronunciation of both parts of speech.

VEX

VEX (veks) v to annoy; to pester; to confuse •Margaret vexed me by poking me with a long, sharp stick. •Stuck at the bottom of a deep well, I found my situation extreme ly vexing. The act of vexing, or the state of being vexed, is vexation. A vexed issue is one that is troubling or puzzling. TO PESTER = trouble or annoy (someone) with frequent or persistent requests or interruptions.

VIABLE

VIABLE (VYE uh bul) adj capable of living; workable •When a doctor says that a patient is no longer viable, it's time to begin planning a funeral. •A fetus is said to be viable when it has developed to the point when it is capable of surviving outside the womb. •Lupe's plan for storing marshmallows in the dome of the Capi tol just wasn't viable.

VICARIOUS

VICARIOUS (vye KAR ee us) adj experienced, performed, or suf fered through some one else; living through the ex pe ri enc es of an oth er as though they were one's own experiences To take vicarious pleasure in someone else's success is to enjoy that person's success as though it were your own. • We all felt a vicarious thrill when the mayor's daughter won fourth prize in the regional kickboxing competition.

VICISSITUDE

VICISSITUDE (vi SIS uh tood) n upheaval; natural change; change in fortune •The vicissitudes of the stock market were too much for Karen; she decided to look for a job that would stay the same from one day to the next. •The vicissitudes of the local political machine were such that one could never quite be certain whom one was supposed to bribe.

VILIFY

VILIFY (VIL uh fye) v to say vile things about; to defame •The teacher was reprimanded for vilifying the slow student in front of the rest of the class. •Our taxi driver paused briefly on the way to the airport to vilify the driver of the car that had nearly forced him off the road. •The political debate was less a debate than a vilification con test. At first the candidates took turns saying nasty things about one another; then they stopped taking turns.

VINDICATE

VINDICATE (VIN duh kayt) v to clear from all blame or suspicion; to jus ti fy •George, having been accused of stealing money from the cash reg is ter, was vindicated when the store manager counted the mon ey again and found that none was missing after all. •Tom's claim of innocence appeared to be vindicated when sever al dozen in mates at the state mental hospital confessed to the crime of which he had been accused. A person who has been vindicated is a person who has found vin di ca tion.

VIRULENT

VIRULENT (VIR uh lunt) adj extremely poisonous; ma lig nant; full of hate •The vir u lent disease quickly swept through the com mu ni ty, leaving many people dead and many more people ex treme ly ill. •The snake was a mem ber of a particularly virulent breed; its bite could kill an elephant. •Jonathan is a virulent antifeminist; he says that all women should sit down and shut up. To be virulent is to be characterized by virulence. Virulent is re lat ed to virus, not to virile, which means manly.

VISIONARY

VISIONARY (VIZH uh ner ee) n a dreamer; someone with im prac ti cal goals or ideas about the future •My uncle was a visionary, not a businessman; he spent too much time tinkering with his antigravity generator and not enough time working in his plumbing business. •The candidate was a visionary; he had a lot of big ideas but no realistic plan for putting them into practice. Visionary can also be an adjective. A visionary proposal is an ide al is tic and usually impractical proposal.

VITIATE

VITIATE (VISH ee ayt) v to make impure; to pollute • For years a zealous group of individuals has campaigned against the use of fluoride in water, claiming that it has vi ti at ed our bodies as well as our morals.

VITROLIC

VITRIOLIC (vi tree AHL ik) adj caustic; full of bitterness Vitriol is another name for sulfuric acid. To be vitriolic is to say or do something so nasty that your words or actions burn like acid. • The review of the new book was so vitriolic that we all wondered whether the reviewer had some personal grudge against the author.

VOCATION

VOCATION (voh KAY shun) n an occupation; a job Your vocation is what you do for a living. • If Stan could figure out how to make a vocation out of watch ing tele vi sion and eating potato chips, he would be one of the most suc cess ful people in the world. Vocational training is job training. Since your vocation is your job, your avocation is your hobby. • The ac coun tant's vocation bored her, but her av o ca tion of mountain climb ing did not.

VOCIFEROUS

VOCIFEROUS (voh SIF ur us) adj loud; noisy • Randy often becomes vociferous during arguments. He doesn't know what he believes, but he states it loudly nevertheless.

VOLATILE

VOLATILE (VAHL uh tul) adj quick to evaporate; highly unstable; explo sive •A volatile liquid is one that evaporates readily. Gasoline is a vol a tile liquid. It evaporates readily, and then the vapor poses a great danger of explosion. •A volatile crowd is one that seems to be in imminent danger of getting out of control or exploding. •The situation in the Middle East was highly volatile; the smallest in ci dent could have set off a war. To be volatile is to be characterized by volatility.

VOLITION

VOLITION (voh LISH un) n will; conscious choice •Insects, lacking volition, simply aren't as interesting as hu mans are. •The question the jury had to answer was whether the killing had been an accident or an act of volition. WILL (noun) = the faculty by which a person decides on and initiates action.

WANTON

WANTON (WAHN tun) adj malicious; unjustifiable; un pro voked; egre gious • Terrorists commit wanton acts on a helpless populace to make their point. Wanton also means intemperate. • A hedonist lives a wanton life in the relentless, unremitting pursuit of pleasure; an ascetic does not.

WILLFUL

WILLFUL (WIL ful) adj deliberate; obstinate; insistent on hav ing one's way •The mother insisted that the killing committed by her son had not been willful, but the jury apparently believed that he had known what he was doing. •When her mother told her she couldn't have a cookie, the willful little girl simply snatched the cookie jar and ran out of the room with it. She had stolen the cookies willfully.

WISTIFUL

WISTFUL (WIST ful) adj yearning; sadly longing •I felt wistful when I saw Steve's fancy new car. I wished that I had enough money to buy one for myself. •The boys who had been cut from the football team watched wist ful ly as the team put together an undefeated season and won the state cham pi on ship.

ZEALOUS

ZEALOUS (ZEL us) adj enthusiastically devoted to some thing; fervent •The zealous young policeman made so many arrests that the city jail soon became overcrowded. •The dictator's followers were so zealous that if he had asked them all to jump off a cliff, most of them would have done so. To be zealous is to be full of zeal, or fervent enthusiasm. An overly zealous person is a zealot.

diatribe

a bitter and prolonged verbal attack - DIATRIBE: an abusive, condemnatory speech Ex: The trucker bellowed a DIATRIBE at the driver who had cut him off. Words with similar meanings: FULMINATION HARANGUE INVECTIVE JEREMIAD MALEDICTION OBLOQUY TIRADE

complaisance

a disposition or tendency to yield to the will of others

antecedent

a preceding occurrence or cause or event ANTECEDENT (an tuh SEED unt) n someone or something that went before; some thing that provides a model for some thing that came after it •Your parents and grandparents could be said to be your an te ced ents; they came before you.

alchemy

a pseudoscientific forerunner of chemistry in medieval times

epitome

a standard or typical example EPITOME (i PIT uh mee) n a brief summary that captures the meaning of the whole; the perfect example of something; a paradigm •The first paragraph of the new novel is an epitome of the entire book; you could read it and understand what the author was try ing to get across. It epitomized the entire work. •Luke's freshman year was the epitome of a college experience; he made friends, joined a fraternity, and ate too much pizza •Eating corn dogs and drinking root beer is the epitome of the good life, as far as Wilson is concerned.

adversity

a state of misfortune or affliction

membrane

a thin pliable sheet of material

dearth

an insufficient quantity or number DEARTH (durth) n lack; scarcity •There is no dearth of comedy at a convention of clowns. •When there is a dearth of food, many people may starve. •There was a dearth of gaiety at the boring Christmas party.

archetype

an original model on which something is patterned ARCHETYPE (AHR kuh type) n an original model or pattern An archetype is similar to a prototype. A prototype is a first, tentative model that is made but that will be improved in later versions. Henry Ford built a prototype of his Model T in his base ment. His mother kicked him out, so he had no choice but to start a motor car company. An archetype is usually something that pre cedes something else. • Plato is the archetype of all philosophers. An archetype is archetypal or archetypical.

cognizant

aware; having knowledge of something COGNIZANT (KAHG nu zunt) adj aware; conscious To be cognizant of your responsibilities is to know what your responsibilities are. • Al was cognizant of the dangers of sword swallowing, but he tried it anyway and hurt himself quite badly.

assimilate

become similar to one's environment

ardent

characterized by intense emotion ARDENT (AHR dunt) adj passionate; enthusiastic •Larry's ardent wooing finally got on Cynthia's nerves, and she told him to get lost. •Blanche happily stuffed badgers from morning to night. She was an ardent taxidermist. To be ardent is to have ardor. • The young lovers were oblivious to ev ery thing except their ardor for each other.

ethereal

characterized by lightness and insubstantiality ETHEREAL (ih THIR ee ul) adj heavenly; as light and in sub stan tial as a gas or ether • The ethereal music we heard turned out to be not angels plucking on their harps but the wind blowing past our satellite-television an ten na. • The ethereal mist on the hillside was delicate and beautiful.

pragmatic

concerned with practical matters

aesthetic

concerning or characterized by an appreciation of beauty or good taste AESTHETIC: concerning the appreciation of beauty. Followers of the AESTHETIC Movement regarded the pursuit of beauty as the only true purpose of art. Related words: AESTHETE: someone unusually sensitive to beauty AESTHETICISM: concern with beauty Words with similar meanings: ARTISTIC TASTEFUL

eccentric

conspicuously or grossly unconventional or unusual ECCENTRIC (ek SEN trik) adj not conventional; a little kooky; ir reg u lar •The eccentric inventor spent all his waking hours fiddling with what he said was a time machine but was actually just an old telephone booth. •Fred's political views are eccentric: He believes that we should have kings instead of presidents and that the gov ern ment should raise mon ey by hold ing bake sales. •The rocket followed an eccentric course; first it veered in one di rec tion, then it veered in another, then it crashed. An eccentric person is a person who has eccentricities (ek sen TRIS uh teez).

intemperance

consumption of alcoholic drinks

debauchery

corruption; self-indulgence DEBAUCHERY (di BAW chuh ree) n wild living; excessive in temperance • Debauchery can be expensive; fortunately for Jeff, his wallet matched his appetite for extravagant pleasures. He died a poor, albeit happy, man. To debauch is to seduce or corrupt. Someone who is debauched has been seduced or corrupted.

affable

courteous and pleasant, sociable, easy to speak to (very similar to amiable) AFFABLE (AF uh bul) adj easy to talk to; friendly • Susan was an affable girl; she could strike up a pleasant conversation with almost anyone. • The Jeffersons' dog was big but affable; it liked to lick little children on the nose. The noun is affability.

abscond

depart secretly and hide ABSCOND: to leave secretly The patron ABSCONDED from the restaurant without paying his bill by sneaking out the back door. Words with similar meanings: FLEE DECAMP ESCAPE

anomaly

deviation from the normal or common order or form or rule

arduous

difficult to accomplish

augment

enlarge or increase AUGMENT (awg MENT) v to make bigger; to add to; to increase • The army augmented its attack by sending in a few thousand more soldiers. To augment a record collection is to add more records to it. Adding another example to this definition would augment it. The act of augmenting is called augmentation.

antithesis

exact opposite - ANTITHESIS (an TITH uh sis) n the direct opposite • Erin is the antithesis of Aaron: Erin is bright and beautiful; Aaron is dull and plain.

presumptuous

excessively forward

condone

excuse, overlook, or make allowances for - CONDONE: to overlook, pardon, or disregard Ex: Some theorists believe that failing to prosecute minor crimes is the same as CONDONING an air of lawlessness. Words with similar meanings: EXCULPATE EXCUSE REMIT

condemn

express strong disapproval of

contrite

feeling regret for a fault or offence CONTRITE (kun TRYTE) adj admitting guilt; especially feeling remorseful To be contrite is to admit whatever terrible thing you did. • Mira was contrite about her mistake, so we forgave her. A criminal who won't confess his crime is not contrite. Saying that you're sorry is an act of contrition (kun TRISH un).

porous

full of pores or vessels or holes

coalesce

fuse or cause to grow together COALESCE (koh uh LES) v to come together as one; to fuse; to unite •When the dough coalesced into a big black blob, we began to wonder whether the cookies would be edible. •The people in our neighborhood coalesced into a powerful force for change in the community. •The Southern coalition in Congress is the group of rep resen t-a tives from Southern states who often vote the same way. A co a li tion is a group of people that has come together for some pur pose, often a political one. Coal miners and cola bottlers might co a lesce into a coalition for the purpose of per suad ing coal mine owners to provide cola ma chines in coal mines.

somber

grave or even gloomy in character

burgeon

grow and flourish BURGEON (BUR jun) v to expand; to flourish • The burgeoning weeds in our yard soon overwhelmed the grass.

credulous

gullible - CREDULOUS: too trusting; gullible Ex: Although some 4-year-olds believe in the Easter Bunny, only the most CREDULOUS 9- year-olds also believe in him. Related words: CREDULITY the quality of being credulous Words with similar meanings: NANE SUSCEPTIBLE TRUSTING

deleterious

harmful, injurious DELETERIOUS (del uh TIR ee us) adj harmful •Smoking cigarettes is deleterious to your health. •Is watching the show "Survivor" deleterious? Of course not. To be deluded is to suffer from a delusion. •That he was a great poet was the delusion of the English teach er, who could scarcely write two complete sentences in a row. •Todd, the well-known jerk, suffered from the delusion that he was a very great man.

censure

harsh criticism or disapproval CENSURE (SEN shur) v to condemn severely for doing some thing bad • The Senate sometimes censures senators for breaking laws or engaging in behavior unbecoming to an elected official. Censure can also be a noun. • The clumsy physician feared the cen sure of his fellow doctors, so he stopped treating anything more com pli cat ed than the com mon cold. A Senate that made a habit of censuring senators might be said to be cen so ri ous. To be censorious is to be highly critical—to do a lot of cen sur ing.

caustic

harsh or corrosive in tone CAUSTIC: biting in wit Ex: Dorothy Parker gained her reputation for CAUSTIC wit from her cutting, yet clever, insults. Words with similar meanings: ACERBIC BITING TRENCHANT CAUSTIC (KAW stik) adj like acid; corrosive Paint remover is a caustic substance; if you spill it on your skin, your skin will burn. •The caustic detergent ate right through Henry's laundry. •The teacher's caustic criticism of Sally's term paper left her in tears. Caustic can be used figuratively as well. A caustic comment is one that is so nasty or insulting that it seems to sting or burn the person to whom it is directed.

cursory

hasty and without attention to detail CURSORY (KUR suh ree) adj hasty; superficial •To give a book a cursory reading is to skim it quickly without comprehending much. •The cursor on Dave's computer made a cursory sweep across the data as he scrolled down the page. To make a cursory attempt at learning French is to memorize a couple of easy words and then say, "The heck with it."

circumspect

heedful of potential consequences CIRCUMSPECT (SUR kum spekt) adj cautious •As a public speaker, Nick was extremely circumspect; he al ways took great care not to say the wrong thing or give offense. •The circumspect general did everything he could not to put his soldiers at unnecessary risk. The word circumspect comes from Greek roots meaning around and look (as do the words circle and inspect). To be circumspect is to look around carefully before doing something.

aghast

horrified

pristine

immaculately clean and unused

contentious

involving or likely to cause controversy Contentious has two meanings: controversial (in terms of an issue); inclined to arguing (in terms of a person). This word does not mean content. It comes from contend, which means to argue. Be chary (see below) of this word. As soon as the discussion turns to politics, Uncle Hank becomes highly contentious, vehemently disagreeing with those who endorse the same positions. CHARY -> Chary rhymes with wary, and it also means to be cautious. They are also synonyms. Jack was wary of GRE words that looked similar, because they usually had different definitions; not so with chary, a word that he began to use interchangeably with wary. CONTENTIOUS (kun TEN shus) adj argumentative; quarrelsome • Liz figured that her contentious style would make her a perfect litigator; after law school, however, the would-be trial attorney discovered that passing the bar requires more than a will to argue. A person looking for a fight is contentious. Two people having a fight are contentious. To be contentious in a discussion is to make a lot of noisy objections. A contender is a fighter. To contend is to fight or argue for something. Someone who breaks the law may have to contend with the law. QUARREL = have an angry argument or disagreement. "stop quarreling with your sister" take exception to or disagree with (something). "some people quarrel with this approach"

intrepid

invulnerable to fear or intimidation

copious

large in number or quantity (especially of discourse) COPIOUS (KOH pee us) adj abundant; plentiful •The champagne at the wedding reception was copious but not very good. •Matt had a copious supply of nails in his workshop. Every where you stepped, it seemed, there was a pile of nails. •Phil ate copiously at the banquet and went home feeling quite sick.

divulge

make known to the public information that was previously known only to a few people or that was meant to be kept a secret

aggravate

make worse

meticulous

marked by extreme care in treatment of details

astute

marked by practical hardheaded intelligence ASTUTE (uh STOOT) adj shrewd; keen in judgment •Morris was an astute judge of character; he was very good at seeing what people are really like. •Yael, who notices every thing important and many things that other people don't see, is an astute observer.

FURTIVE

marked by quiet and caution and secrecy FURTIVE (FUR tiv) adj secretive; sly •Cal wiggled his ears while the countess was talking to him in a furtive attempt to catch our attention. •The burglars were furtive, but not furtive enough; the alert police man grabbed them as they carried the color TV through the Rubenstein's back door. SLY = having or showing a cunning and deceitful nature. CUNNING = having or showing skill in achieving one's ends by deceit or evasion.

aberrant

markedly different from an accepted norm ABERRATION (ab uh RAY shun) n something not typical; a deviation from the standard •SØren's bad behavior was an aberration. So was Harry's good be havior. That is, SØren's was usually good and Harry's was usually bad. •The chef at this restaurant is dreadful; the good meal we just had was an aberration. •A snowstorm in June is an aberration; snow doesn't normally fall in June. An aberration is an aberrant (uh BER unt) occurrence. • SØren's be hav ior was ab er rant. The summer snowstorm was ab er rant. Note carefully the pronunciation of these words.

unfettered

not bound by shackles and chains

approbation

official recognition or approval APPROBATION (ap ruh BAY shun) n approval; praise •The crowd expressed its approbation of what the team had done by glee ful ly covering the field with chicken carcasses. •The am bas sa dor's actions met with the approbation of his command er in chief. Approbation is a fancy word for approval, to which it is closely relat ed. Disapprobation is disapproval.

equivocal

open to two or more interpretations EQUIVOCAL (ih KWIV uh kul) adj ambiguous; intentionally confusing; capable of being interpreted in more than one way Ambiguous means unclear. To be equivocal is to be intentionally ambiguous. •Joe's response was equivocal; we couldn't tell whether he meant yes or no, which is precisely what Joe wanted. •Dr. Festen's equivocal diagnosis made us think that he had no idea what Mrs. Johnson had. To be equivocal is to equivocate. To equivocate is to mislead by saying confusing or ambiguous things. • When we asked Harold whether that was his car that was parked in the middle of the hardware store, he equivocated and asked, "In which aisle?"

slight

pay no attention to, disrespect

cogent

powerfully persuasive Ex: His essay writing, while full of clever turns of phrases, lacks cogency: the examples he used to support his points are at times irrelevant and, ins one instance, downright ludicrous. Swayed by the COGENT argument of the defense, the jury had no choice but to acquit the defendant. - COGENT: convincing and well reasoned Related words: COGITATE: to think deeply Words with similar meanings: CONVINCING PERSUASIVE SOUND TELLING SOLID VALID

covert

secret or hidden COVERT (KOV urt) adj secret; hidden To be covert is to be covered. Covert activities are secret activities. A covert military operation is one the public knows nothing about. The opposite of covert is overt. Overt (OH vurt) means open or un con cealed.

coercive

serving or intended to compel by force or authority

abrasive

sharply disagreeable

makeshift

something contrived to meet an urgent need or emergency; done or made using whatever is available CONTRIVED = CONTRIVED (kun TRYVED) adj artificial; labored •Sam's acting was contrived: No one in the audience believed his char ac ter or enjoyed his performance. •The artist was widely ad mired for his originality, but his paintings seemed contrived to me. •No one laughed at Mark's contrived attempt at humor. A contrivance is a mechanical device, usually something rigged up.

catalyst

something that causes an important event to happen - CATALYST: something that brings about a change in something else Ex: The imposition of harsh taxes was the CATALYST that finally brought on the revolution. Related Words: CATALYZE: to bring about a change in something else

ancillary

subordinate or supplementary

detraction

the act of discrediting or detracting from someone's reputation (especially by slander)

ambience

the atmosphere of an environment AMBIENCE (AM bee uns) n atmosphere; mood; feeling • By decorating their house with plastic beach balls and Popsicle sticks, the Cramers created a playful ambience that delighted young children. A restaurant's ambience is the look, mood, and feel of the place. People sometimes say that a restaurant has "an atmosphere of am bi ence." To do so is redundant—atmosphere and ambience mean the same thing. Ambience is a French word that can also be pronounced "ahm BYAHNS." The adjective ambient (AM bee unt) means sur round ing or circulating.

candor

the quality of being honest and straightforward in attitude and speech CANDOR (KAN dur) n truthfulness; sincere honesty •My best friend exhibited candor when he told me that for many years now he has believed me to be a jerk. •Teddy appreciated Ross's candor; Teddy was glad to know that Ross thought Teddy's sideburns looked stupid. To show candor is to be candid. What is candid about the cam era on "Candid Camera"? The camera is candid because it is truthful in show ing what people do when they can't turn off the coffee ma chine in the office where they're applying for a job. Candid does not mean concealed or hidden, even though the camera on "Can did Camera" is concealed. To be candid is to speak frankly.

placate

to appease, soothe, pacify APPEASE = APPEASE (uh PEEZ) v to soothe; to pacify by giving in to •Jaleel appeased his angry mother by promising to make his bed every morning without fail until the end of time. •The trembling farmer handed over all his grain, but still the em per or was not appeased. The noun is appeasement

abstain

to choose not to do something; to restrain oneself from doing or enjoying something. During Lent, practicing Catholics ABSTAIN from eating meat. Words with similar meanings: FORBEAR REFRAIN WITHHOLD

belie

to contradict, to give a false impression The key to answering a text completion question that uses belie is to know how the word functions in context. Let's take a look below: Her surface calm belied her roiling emotions. The effortless fluidity with which the pianist's fingers moved belied the countless hours he had practiced. Her upbeat attitude during the group project belied her inherent pessimism towards any collective endeavor. In each case, note how the outward appearance does not match up with the reality. That contradiction is the essence of belie.

avow

to declare or affirm solemnly and formally as true

amortize

to diminish by installment payments

misconstrue

to interpret wrongly, mistake the meaning of CONSTRUE = CONSTRUE (kun STROO) v to interpret •Preston construed his contract as giving him the right to do any thing he wanted. •The law had always been construed as permitting the behavior for which Katya had been arrested. •The meaning of the poem, as I construed it, had to do with the love of a man for his dog. To misconstrue is to misinterpret. • Tommy mis con strued Pamela's smile, but he certainly did not mis con strue the slap she gave him.

assuage

to make (an unpleasant feeling) less intense. to make easier or milder, relieve; to quiet, calm; to put an end to, appease, satisfy, quench Ex: A massage can assuage the soreness in your muscles. Synonyms: Relieve, ease, Mitigate, suppress

adulterate

to make something impure or weaker by adding something of inferior quality. corrupt, debase, or make impure by adding a foreign or inferior substance ADULTERATE: to make impure The restaurateur made his ketchup last longer by ADULTERATING it with water. Related words: UNADULTERATED: pure ADULTERY an illicit relationship; an affair

daunt

to overcome with fear, intimidate; to dishearten, discourage DAUNT (dawnt) v to make fearful; to intimidate •The steepness of the mountain daunted the team of amateur climbers, who hadn't realized what they were in for. •The size of the players on the visiting team was daunting; the players on the home team began to perspire nervously. To be dauntless or undaunted is to be fearless or unintimidated. • The rescue crew was undaunted by the flames and ran into the burning house to look for survivors. They were dauntless in their effort to save the people inside.

belabor

to work on excessively; to thrash soundly BELABOR (bi LAY bur) v to go over repeatedly or to an absurd extent •For more than an hour, the boring speak er belabored his point about the chal lenge of foreign com pe ti tion. •Mr. Irving spent the entire period be la bor ing the obvious; he made the same dumb observation over and over again

evanescent

vanishing, soon passing away; EVANESCENT (ev uh NES unt) adj fleeting; vanishing; happening for only the briefest period • Meteors are evanescent: They last so briefly that it is hard to tell whether one has actually appeared.

contiguous

very close or connected in space or time CONTIGUOUS (kun TIG yoo us) adj side by side; adjoining Two countries that share a border are contiguous; so are two events that happened one right after the other. If two countries are contiguous, the territory they cover is continuous. That is, it spreads or continues across both countries without any interruption

prudent

wise, careful, cautious

covet

wish, long, or crave for (something, especially the property of another person) - COVET (KUV it) v to wish for enviously •To covet thy neighbor's wife is to want thy neighbor's wife for thyself. •Any position at MTV is a highly coveted job. To be covetous is to be envious.