Flamboyant

WORD OF THE DAY

flamboyant / flam-BOY-ant / adjective

Definition

: marked by or given to strikingly elaborate or colorful display or behavior

Examples

The circus performers were easily identifiable by their flamboyant costumes and stage makeup.

"When costume designer Meredith Markworth-Pollack began working on a modern-day reboot of the 1980s soap 'Dynasty'—which debuts Wednesday evening on the CW—she wanted to pay homage to the original series' flashy, flamboyant fashions." 

— Raquel Laneri, The New York Post, 9 Oct. 2017

Did You Know?

If you've ever heard of a dessert served flambé, you already have some insight into the origins of today's word. Flamboyant, which was borrowed into English from French in the 19th century, can be traced back to Old French flambe, meaning "flame." 

In its earliest uses flamboyant referred to a style of architecture, often in the florid French Gothic style, which featured waving curves that suggested flames. 

Eventually, the word developed a more general second sense for anything eye-catching or showy. And of course, Old French flambe is also the origin of the English adjective flambé.

Debilitate

WORD OF THE DAY

debilitate / dih-BIL-uh-tayt / verb 

Definition

1: to impair the strength of 

2: enfeeble

Examples

The company offers exercises and writing prompts that promise to help would-be novelists debilitated by writer's block get words onto the page.

"No matter how much Dolly tries to engineer things in her favor, she's forever an outsider—a widow suffering from, though not debilitated by, loneliness—and the only person who would understand how she feels is her dead husband, Ephraim." 

— Hilton Als, The New Yorker, 1 May 2017

Did You Know?

Debilitate, enfeeble, undermine, and sap all share the general sense "to weaken." But while debilitate holds the distinction among these words of coming from the Latin word for "weak"—debilis—it packs a potent punch. 

Often used of disease or something that strikes like a disease or illness, debilitate might suggest a temporary impairment—but a pervasive one at that. Enfeeble, a very close synonym of debilitate, connotes a pitiable, but often reversible, condition of weakness and helplessness. 

Undermine and sap suggest a weakening by something working surreptitiously and insidiously.

Hortative

WORD OF THE DAY

hortative / HOR-tuh-tiv / adjective

Definition

1: giving exhortation 

2: serving to advise or warn

Examples

"None can understand or interpret Michelangelo unless we recognise the extent to which the mysticism of Catholic faith coloured his beliefs and work…. [If] we look back to the Pietà in St Peter's, finished when he was only 24, we find an image of such profound piety and sympathy that crowds fall silent in its presence without any hortative 'Silenzio!'" 

— Brian Sewell, The Evening Standard (London), 24 Mar. 2006

"But it's important to remember that 'Jersey Shore' is on MTV, a youth-oriented cable channel that has a hortative streak: series like 'Teen Mom' and 'If You Really Knew Me' carry a strong 'don't try this at home' message." 

— Alessandra Stanley, The New York Times, 20 Aug. 2010

Did You Know?

"We give nothing so freely as advice," observed French writer François de la Rochefoucauld in 1665. Hortative and exhort (meaning "to urge earnestly") are two words that testify to our eagerness to counsel others. Both trace to Latin hortari, meaning "to urge." 

Hortative has been used as both a noun (meaning "an advisory comment") and an adjective since the 17th century, but the noun is now extremely rare. You may also encounter the adjectives hortatory, exhortatory, and exhortative, all of which have the same meaning as hortative.

Abeyance

WORD OF THE DAY

abeyance / uh-BAY-unss /  noun

Definition

1a: a state of temporary inactivity 

1b: suspension — used chiefly in the phrase in abeyance

2: a lapse in succession during which there is no person in whom a title is vested

Examples

The misdemeanor charges are in abeyance while the suspect is being prosecuted for the felony.

"The 1950–53 Korean War ended in an armistice, not a peace treaty, so hostilities have merely been in abeyance." 

— Rick Gladstone and David E. Sanger, The New York Times, 26 Sept. 2017

Did You Know?

Abeyance has something in common with yawn. Today, yawn implies sleep or boredom, but years ago it could also signify longing or desire ("Full many men know I that yawn and gape after some fat and rich benefice" —Thomas Hoccleve, 1420). 

The Old French word for "yawn" was baer, which joined the prefix a- ("in a state or condition of") to form abaer, a verb meaning "to expect" or "await." There followed Anglo-French abeyance, which referred to a state of expectation—specifically, a person's expectation of inheriting a title or property. But when we adopted abeyanceinto English in the 16th century, we applied the expectation to the property itself: a property or title "in abeyance" is in temporary limbo, waiting to be claimed by a rightful heir or owner.

Conciliate

WORD OF THE DAY

conciliate / kun-SILL-ee-ayt / verb

Definition

1: appease

2: to gain (as goodwill) by pleasing acts

3a: to make compatible 

3b: reconcile

4: to become friendly or agreeable

Examples

"He paused, half hopefully, half timidly, whenever Captain Whalley made the slightest movement in the deck-chair, as though expecting to be conciliated by a soft speech or else rushed upon and hunted off the bridge." 

— Joseph Conrad, The End of the Tether, 1902

"The notion of celebrating the American worker first surfaced in the early 19th century during the infancy of the American labor movement. Unfortunately, it took a nationwide railroad strike of nearly 4,000 factory employees … to get things started.… In an effort to conciliate organized labor after the strike, President Cleveland and Congress joined forces to declare Labor Day a national holiday." 

— Michelle Wilson, The Tallahassee (Florida) Democrat, 1 Sept. 2017

Did You Know?

A council is "an assembly or meeting for consultation, advice, or discussion," and it is often the task of a council to find compatibility in opposing views. It seems fitting, therefore, that the words council and conciliate both derive from the Latin word concilium, which means "assembly" or "council." 

Conciliate comes to us from the Latin conciliatus, the past participle of the verb conciliare (meaning "to assemble, unite, win over"), which in turn is from concilium. Council, on the other hand, derives from the Anglo-French cunseil or cuncile, from concilium. Other conciliumdescendants in English include conciliar ("of, relating to, or issued by a council") and the rare conciliabule ("a clandestine meeting especially of conspirators or rebels").

Cachinnate

WORD OF THE DAY

cachinnate / verb / KAK-uh-nayt

Definition

: to laugh loudly or immoderately

Examples

As the author read from her newest book, we tried to tune out the spectator cachinnating at the back of the auditorium.

"And all the way the Fates walking with him, whispering and cachinnating, ordering him to tread there, breathe here, spit there, unless he wanted to be eviscerated by destiny." 

— Will Self, Tough, Tough Toys for Tough, Tough Boys, 1998

Did You Know?

Cachinnate has been whooping it up in English since the 19th century. The word derives from the Latin verb cachinnare, meaning "to laugh loudly," and cachinnare was probably coined in imitation of a loud laugh. As such, cachinnare is much like the Old English ceahhetan, the Old High German kachazzen, and the Greek kachazein—all words of imitative origin that essentially meant "to laugh loudly." 

Our words  giggle and guffaw are unrelated to those (and to each other) but they too are believed to have been modeled after the sound of laughter.

Terpsichorean

WORD OF THE DAY

terpsichorean / terp-sih-kuh-REE-un / adjective

Definition

: of or relating to dancing

Examples

"Cronkhite's exuberant dances look great but let the kids act like kids, and don't demand terpsichorean polish beyond the cast's abilities." 

— Marty Clear, The Bradenton Herald, 13 Jan. 2017

"The musical theater specialists at Signature Theatre will test their terpsichorean mettle with the toe-tappin' 'Crazy for You,' the show that clinched Susan Stroman's reputation as a gleeful and inventive choreographer...." 

— Nelson Pressley, The Washington Post, 8 Sept. 2017

Did You Know?

In Greek and Roman mythology, Terpsichore was one of the nine muses, those graceful sister-goddesses who presided over learning and the arts. Terpsichore was the patron of dance and choral song (and later lyric poetry), and in artistic representations she is often shown dancing and holding a lyre. Her name, which earned an enduring place in English through the adjective terpsichorean, literally means "dance-enjoying," from terpsis, meaning "enjoyment," and choros, meaning "dance." 

Choros is also the source of choreography and chorus (in Athenian drama, choruses consisted of dancers as well as singers). The only other word we know that incorporates terpsis is terpodion, an obsolete term for a piano-like musical instrument that was invented around 1816 but never really caught on.

Recumbent

WORD OF THE DAY 

recumbent / rih-KUM-bunt / adjective 

Definition

1a: suggestive of repose 

1b: leaning, resting

1c: lying down

2: representing a person lying down

3: (of a bicycle) having the seat positioned so that the rider's legs are extended horizontally forward to the pedals and the body is reclined

Examples

When Bert glanced at his father's recumbent form in the armchair, he immediately realized that he could use a good nap himself.

"The exhibit includes a limestone statue of a recumbent lion carved between 305 and 30 BCE." 

— Amy McRary, The Knoxville News-Sentinel, 29 Jan. 2017

Did You Know?

If you're ready to take your vocabulary lying down, you'll want to be familiar with the synonyms recumbent, prone, supine, and prostrate, all of which mean "lying down." Recumbent, which derives from the Latin prefix re- and the verb cumbere, meaning "to lie down," focuses on the posture or position native to sleeping or resting. Prone describes someone who is lying facedown, as, for example, in doing push-ups. Supine flips it over, suggesting the position of someone lying inert on the back, while prostrate implies a full-scale physical collapse or submission, regardless of the exact position of the defeated body. Recumbent, dating from 17th century, is the newest of the four words; the others all entered English before the 16th century.

Stultify

WORD OF THE DAY

stultify / STUL-tuh-fye /verb

Definition

1: to cause to appear or be stupid, foolish, or absurdly illogical

2a: to impair, invalidate, or make ineffective 

2b: negate

2c: to have a dulling or inhibiting effect on

Examples

What started out as a promising plan to redesign the square ended up being stultified by bureaucracy and too many conflicting special interests.

"But I have found the capacity to block off certain thoughts. Like, with this film, about the scale of it or how people loved the Potter films and what's at stake and not wanting to screw it up. I'm getting better at blocking that part of my head because it can stultify you." 

— Eddie Redmayne, quoted in The Straits Times (Singapore), 16 Nov. 2016

Did You Know?

Stupid or absurd behavior can be almost laughable at times. That's the kind of situation depicted in an 1871 London Daily News article, describing how a witness "stultified himself" by admitting that he was too far off to hear what he had claimed to have heard. But there is nothing especially funny about the now-archaic original usage of stultify. 

The word was first used in the mid-1700s in legal contexts, where if you stultified yourself, you claimed to be of unsound mind and thus not responsible for your acts. Nor is there humor in the most common meaning of stultify nowadays, that of rendering someone or something useless or ineffective.

Permeable

WORD OF THE DAY
permeable \ PER-mee-uh-bul \ adjective
 
Definition
: capable of being permeated
: penetrable
: having pores or openings that permit liquids or gases to pass through


Examples
"More rigid, less permeable foam insulation lines the home's walls to block wind and water from breaching its façade."
— Troy McMullen, Forbes, 30 Aug. 2017


"Massachusetts politicians chasing the company will soon realize just how insular and secretive Amazon is. I often compare it to Willy Wonka's chocolate factory. They sometimes invite people in—to hire them or pitch them to be customers of collaborators—but the current headquarters in Seattle is not a very permeable place."
— Scott Kirsner, The Boston Globe, 29 Oct. 2017


Did You Know?
The synonyms permeable and pervious both make good use of the Latin prefix per-, meaning "through." Permeable traces back to a combination of per- and the Latin verb meare, meaning "to go" or "to pass," whereas the history of pervious calls upon Latin via, meaning "way."
Both permeable and its more common relative, the verb permeate, still retain the original Latin idea of "passing through."
Pervious also has the connotation of "penetrating through" but is also used to describe a susceptible mind, as in "Though set in his ways, the professor was pervious to reason." The prefix per- also gave English pervade, meaning "to become diffused throughout every part of." Meare also has other English descendants, including congé, which can mean "a formal permission to depart," and irremeable, meaning "offering no possibility of return."

Fructify

WORD OF THE DAY

fructify / FRUK-tuh-fye / verb

Definition

1 : to bear fruit

2 : to make fruitful or productive

Examples

My parents are in a comfortable financial position, thanks to some investments that have recently begun to fructify.

"I don't care for the jokey body language and elaborate costuming of the four male bees in the Waltz of the Flowers, and yet I find myself paying close attention each time to how tightly they're woven into the musical tapestry. They're not just there to fructify the 16 female flowers, they also become part of one dance pattern after another…." 

— Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times, 16 Dec. 2013

Did You Know?

Fructify derives from Middle English fructifien and ultimately from the Latin noun fructus, meaning "fruit." When the word was first used in English in the 14th century, it literally referred to the actions of plants that bore fruit; later it was used transitively to refer to the action of making something fruitful, such as soil. The word also expanded to encompass a figurative sense of "fruit," and it is now more frequently used to refer to the giving forth of something in profit from something else (such as dividends from an investment). Fructusalso gave us the name of the sugar fructose, as well as usufruct, which refers to the legal right to enjoy the fruits or profits of something that belongs to someone else.

Gravamen

WORD OF THE DAY
gravamen \ gruh-VAY-mun \ noun
 
Definition
: the material or significant part of a grievance or complaint


Examples
The gravamen of Walter's letter to the editor was that the newspaper frequently reported on the school system's failures but rarely covered its successes and improvements.


"In the ultimate legal absurdity, even the prosecutors trying the case occasionally are barred from seeing the evidence that provides the gravamen of their arguments."
— Petra Bartosiewicz, The Contra Costa (California) Times, 6 Dec. 2009


Did You Know?
Gravamen is not a word you hear every day, but it does show up occasionally in modern-day publications. It comes from the Latin verb gravare, meaning "to burden," and ultimately from the Latin adjective gravis, meaning "heavy."
Fittingly, gravamen refers to the part of a grievance or complaint that gives it weight or substance. In legal contexts, gravamen is used, synonymously with gist, to refer to the grounds on which a legal action is sustainable.
Gravis has given English several other weighty words, including gravity, grieve, and the adjective grave, meaning "important" or "serious."

Diaphanous

WORD OF THE DAY
diaphanous \ dye-AF-uh-nus \ adjective
 
Definition
1: characterized by such fineness of texture as to permit seeing through
2a: characterized by extreme delicacy of form
2b: ethereal
3 : insubstantial, vague


Examples
"For an hour and 45 minutes, Jackson wound through the various chapters of her career, directing her diaphanous voice to nearly three dozen songs…. "
— Brian McCollum, The Detroit Free Press, 30 Oct. 2017


"… no element of Sienna Miller’s wardrobe—the hippy vests, the diaphanous vintage dresses, the scrunched, sun-weathered lace blouses—went undiscussed or undocumented."
— Mark Holgate, Vogue, 30 Oct. 2017


Did You Know?
Can you guess which of the following words come from the same Greek root as diaphanous?


A. epiphany B. fancy C. phenomenon D. sycophant E. emphasis F. phase


The Greek word phainein shows through more clearly in some of our quiz words than others, but it underlies all of them. The groundwork for diaphanous was laid when phainein (meaning "to show") was combined with dia- (meaning "through").
From that pairing came the Greek diaphanēs, parent of the Medieval Latin diaphanus, which is the direct ancestor of our English word.

Sustain

WORD OF THE DAY
sustain \ suh-STAYN \ verb
 
Definition
1: to provide with nourishment
2: keep up, prolong
3a: to support the weight of
3b: prop
3c: to carry or withstand (a weight or pressure)
4a : to buoy up
4b: suffer, undergo
5a: to support as true, legal, or just
5b: to allow or admit as valid


Examples
"It takes a village, a tribe, and a sorority to sustain one another, to flourish and to become an accomplished adult. So sisterhood means inspiring women around me, encouraging each other, crying, laughing, stumbling, and continuing on the path."
— Diana Tofan, Glamour, November 2017


"So one of our main goals was how can we make the game safer, prevent the injury that I sustained and that others sustained, head and neck injuries, from happening without affecting the speed, intensity, heritage or adding any more rules to the game."
— Thomas Smith, quoted on National Public Radio, 6 Jan. 2014


Did You Know?
Sustain, prop, buttress, and brace all mean "to provide support for something or someone." Sustain (from Latin sus-, meaning "up," plus tenēre, meaning "to hold") may suggest constantly holding up or maintaining ("the floor sustains the weight of dozens of bookcases").
Prop often implies a tendency to fall, sink, or recede on the part of the thing being treated—and therefore, a need for strengthening or reinforcing ("propped up the damaged fence with long boards"). Buttress tends to involve strengthening, reinforcing, or stabilizing at a stress point ("buttress the economy").
Brace typically suggests supporting or strengthening so that the thing treated is made firm, unyielding, or rigid against pressure ("brace the shelf with an angle iron").

Orphic

WORD OF THE DAY
orphic \ OR-fik \ adjective
 
Definition
1: (capitalized) of or relating to Orpheus or the rites or doctrines ascribed to him
2: mystic, oracular
3: fascinating, entrancing


Examples
"'No summer ever came back, and no two summers ever were alike,' said I, with a degree of Orphic wisdom that astonished myself."
— Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Blithedale Romance, 1852


"The market skipped higher last week after some Orphic hints from the Federal Reserve Board that it may lower interest rates this summer."
— Alison Grant, The Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio), 26 Mar. 2007


Did You Know?
Orpheus was a hero of Greek mythology who was supposed to possess superhuman musical skills. With his legendary lyre, he was said to be able to make even the rocks and trees dance around. In fact, when his wife Eurydice died, he was nearly able to use his lyre to secure her return from the underworld.
Later on, according to legend, he was killed at the bidding of Dionysus, and an oracle of Orpheus was established that came to rival the oracle of Apollo at Delphi. Because of the oracle of Orpheus, orphic can mean "oracular." Because of Orpheus' musical powers, orphic can also mean "entrancing."

Wend

WORD OF THE DAY
wend \ WEND \ verb
 
Definition
1: to direct one's course
2: travel, proceed


Examples
The hikers wended their way along the forest trail toward the evening's campsite.


"Meanwhile, several lawsuits involving the hotel developments that stoked the city's political divides are still wending their way through the courts."
— Sheila Mullane Estrada, The Tampa Bay Times, 13 Oct. 2017


Did You Know?
Wend is related to the verb wind, which means, among other things, "to follow a series of curves and turns." It is also a distant relative of the verb wander.
Wend itself began its journey in Old English as wendan, which was used in various now-obsolete senses relating to turning or changing direction or position and which is akin to the Old English windan ("to twist").
Wend has twisted itself into various meanings over the years. Most of its senses—including "to come about," "to depart," "to change," and "to betake"—have since wandered off into obscurity, but its use in senses related to going or moving along a course has lent the English verb go its past tense form went (as a past tense form of wend, went has long since been superseded by wended).
The current sense of wend, "to direct or to proceed," is holding steady on the path.

Maieutic

WORD OF THE DAY

maieutic / may-YOO-tik / adjective

Definition

: relating to or resembling the Socratic method of eliciting new ideas from another

Examples

"The maieutic art of Socrates consists, essentially, of asking questions designed to destroy prejudices; false beliefs which are often traditional or fashionable beliefs; false answers, given in the spirit of ignorant cocksureness." 

— Karl Popper, Conjectures and Refutations, 1962

"Montaigne wrote as a kind of maieutic exercise, a way of drawing his thoughts into the light of day, of discovering what he wanted to say as he said it." 

— James Somers, The Atlantic, 21 Dec. 2010

Did You Know?

Maieutic comes from maieutikos, the Greek word for "of midwifery." In one of Plato's Dialogues, Socrates applies maieutikos to his method of bringing forth new ideas by reasoning and dialogue; he thought the technique analogous to those a midwife uses in delivering a baby (Socrates' mother was a midwife). 

A teacher who uses maieutic methods can be thought of as an intellectual midwife who assists students in bringing forth ideas and conceptions previously latent in their minds.

Candor

WORD OF THE DAY
candor \ KAN-der \ noun
 
Definition
1: whiteness, brilliance
2a: freedom from prejudice or malice
2b: fairness
3a: unreserved, honest, or sincere expression
3b: forthrightness


Examples
"In an e-mail, Shonda Rhimes praised [Jenji] Kohan's kindness and candor, calling her one of the few showrunners with whom she can talk honestly about career strategy."
— Emily Nussbaum, The New Yorker, 4 Sept. 2017


"'I pay very little attention to legal rules, statutes, constitutional provisions,' he said in a retirement interview. He deserves credit for candor, at least."
— National Review, 2 Oct. 2017


Did You Know?
The origins of candor shine through in its first definition. Candor traces back to the Latin verb candēre ("to shine or glow"), which in turn derives from the same ancient root that gave the Welsh language can, meaning "white," and the Sanskrit language candati, which translates to "it shines."
Other descendants of candēre in English include candid, incandescent, candle, and the somewhat less common candent and candescent (both of which are synonyms of incandescent in the sense of "glowing from or as if from great heat").
There is even excandescence, an uncommon word that refers to a feverish condition brought on by anger or passion.

Encapsulate

WORD OF THE DAY
encapsulate / in-KAP-suh-layt \ verb
 
Definition
1: to enclose in or as if in a capsule
2a: to show or express in a brief way
2b: epitomize, summarize
3: to become enclosed in a capsule


Examples
"Just one game encapsulated everything the Patriots have done well in the red zone this year and everything they have not."
— Adam Kurkjian, The Boston Herald, 15 Oct. 2017


"Like many other research groups, the Brown team set out to improve the oral uptake of drugs by encapsulating them in polymers that would stick to the mucosal lining of the stomach and intestines."
— Rebecca Rawls, Chemical & Engineering News, 31 Mar. 1997


Did You Know?
Encapsulate and its related noun, capsule, derive from capsula, a diminutive form of the Latin noun capsa, meaning "box." Capsa also gave us our noun case (the container kind; the legal sense has a different origin).
The original sense of encapsulate, meaning "to enclose something in a capsule," first appeared in the late 19th century.
Its extended meaning, "to give a summary or synopsis of something," plays on the notion of a capsule as something compact, self-contained, and often easily digestible. There is also a verb capsule, which is more or less synonymous with encapsulate.

Maudlin

WORD OF THE DAY

maudlin / MAUD-lin / adjective

Definition

1: drunk enough to be emotionally silly

2: weakly and effusively sentimental

Examples

Rather than give his aunt a maudlin greeting card, Jake looked for one that was more in line with her snarky sense of humor.

"There are scenes of violence, grieving, hardship and heartbreak, but 'Rags' never melts into a puddle of maudlin self-pity. It maintains an optimistic attitude." 

— James Gill, The New Orleans Advocate, 25 Oct. 2017

Did You Know?

The history of maudlin owes as much to the Bible as to the barroom. The biblical Mary Magdalene is often (though some say mistakenly) identified with the weeping sinner who washed Jesus' feet with her tears to repent for her sins. 

This association led to the frequent depiction of Mary Magdalene as a weeping penitent, and even the name Magdalene came to suggest teary emotion to many English speakers. 

It was then that maudlin, an alteration of Magdalene, appeared in the English phrase "maudlin drunk," which, as one Englishman explained in 1592, described a tearful drunken state whereby "a fellow will weepe for kindnes in the midst of his Ale and kisse you."

Anachronism

WORD OF THE DAY

anachronism / uh-NAK-ruh-niz-um / noun

Definition

1a: an error in chronology 

1b: a chronological misplacing of persons, events, objects, or customs in regard to each other

2a: a person or a thing that is chronologically out of place

2b: one from a former age that is incongruous in the present

3: the state or condition of being chronologically out of place

Examples

"There are the truly strange anachronisms throughout. Félicie traipses around in denim shorts, and the characters … make 'Hammer Time' jokes. And yet we know it's supposed to be the 19th century because of the proliferation of top hats and horse-drawn carriages, and because both the Eiffel Tower and Statue of Liberty are under construction." 

— Katie Walsh, The Los Angeles Times, 24 Aug. 2017

"With social media and its instantaneous but faux connection, postcards are a quaint anachronism. Part of me is hopelessly old-fashioned, so I'll revive the practice of sending 'postcards' for the next few weeks in lieu of normal columns." 

— Mark A. Cohen, Forbes, 9 Oct. 2017

Did You Know?

An anachronism is something that is out of place in terms of time or chronology. The word derives from chronos, the Greek word for "time," and ana-, a Greek prefix meaning "up," "back," or "again." 

In its earliest English use, anachronism referred to an error in the dating of something (as, for example, in etymology, when a word or use is mistakenly assumed to have arisen earlier than it did). 

Anachronisms were sometimes distinguished from parachronisms, chronological errors in which dates are set later than is correct. But parachronism did not stand the test of time. It is now a very rare word.