Word of the Day

[D. Allan]

fissiparous (fih-SIP-uh-rus), adjective

: tending to break up into parts : divisive

Example Sentence:

The reorganization of management can have a fissiparous effect on the rest of the company.

Did you know?

When it first entered English in the 19th century, "fissiparous" was concerned with reproduction. In biology, a fissiparous organism is one that produces new individuals by fission; that is, by dividing into separate parts, each of which becomes a unique organism. (Most strains of bacteria do this.) "Fissiparous" derives from Latin "fissus," the past participle of "findere" ("to split"), and "parere," meaning "to give birth to" or "to produce." Other "parere" offspring refer to other forms of reproduction, including "oviparous" ("producing eggs that hatch outside the body") and "viviparous" ("producing living young instead of eggs"). By the end of the 19th century "fissiparous" had acquired a figurative meaning, describing something that breaks into parts or causes something else to break into parts.

- Merriam-Webster Online

[Gail]

I hope to partake of this one day- Gail:

Word of the Day: Opsimathy (noun)

Pronunciation: [ahp-'si-mê-thi]

Definition: (Literary) Late learning, learning late in life.

Usage: The word is a rare literary form but we predict an imminent come-back. A person who takes on learning late in life is an "opsimath" ['ahp-si-mæth], as a "polymath" (poly "many" + math) is someone of encyclopedic learning or polymathy [pa-'li-mê-thi]).

Suggested Usage: As the English-speaking population ages and the limits of life expectancy advance, opsimathy promises to become more prominent and the word less literary and more colloquial. Opsimathy was once frowned upon, considered less effective by educators than early learning. However, any university administrator will tell you that the opsimath population is growing in the U.S.

Etymology: Greek opse "late" + math- "learning." "Mathematics" shares the same origin; it derives from the adjective of mathema "science, learning" from manthanein "to learn." The PIE stem *men-dhe- also underlies Russian mudry "wise," Avestan mazda "wise," Sanskrit mantrah "counsel, prayer," and Albanian mund "can." Akin to Latin mens, mentis "mind" in "mental," Greek "mentor," and the Latin suffix -ment. The initial constituent, "opsi-," is also used in the rare word, "opsigamy" [op-'si-gê-mi] which means "marriage late in life."

—Dr. Language, yourDictionary.com

[D. Allan]

Very interesting. Am seriously considering indulging in some opsimathy myself - soon. I hope never to have the opportunity for opsigamy!

[D. Allan]

morganatic (mor-guh-NAT-ik), adjective

: of, relating to, or being a marriage between a member of a royal or noble family and a person of inferior rank in which the rank of the inferior partner remains unchanged and the children of the marriage do not succeed to the titles, fiefs, or entailed property of the parent of higher rank

Example Sentence:

The king's son, the child of a morganatic marriage, will never rule.

Did you know?

Although the deprivations imposed on the lower-ranking spouse by a morganatic marriage may seem like a royal pain in the neck, the word "morganatic" actually comes from a word for a marriage benefit. The New Latin term "morganatica" means "morning gift" and refers to a gift that a new husband traditionally gave to his bride on the morning after the marriage. So why was the New Latin phrase "matrimonium ad morganaticam," which means literally "marriage with morning gift," the term for a morganatic marriage? Because it was just that -- the wife got the morning gift, but that's all she was entitled to of her husband's possessions.

-Merriam-Webster Online

[Gail]

Very interesting. Am seriously considering indulging in some opsimathy myself - soon. I hope never to have the opportunity for opsigamy!

Oh, Dave- don't quite give up on the idea yet! You just never know!!

[Gail]

Are you guilty of this? Gail

Word of the Day: Kibitz (verb)

Pronunciation: ['ki-bits]

Definition: To look on without participating; to offer meddlesome advice to others; to talk idly or annoyingly.

Usage: Today's word is not to be confused with a kibbutz (plural "kibbutzim"), with accent on the second syllable, the communal farms in Israel. A kibitzer is someone whose participation does not move beyond words; a back-seat driver is a kibitzer.

Suggested Usage: The first meaning of today's word is someone who looks on without participating, "I have the only wife in the world who kibitzes when we watch television! I never know what the shows are about." But it also means to offer meddlesome advice, "I don't have a lawyer but a legal kibitzer who has never seen the inside of a courtroom."

Etymology: Today's is a Yiddish word from German kiebitzen "to look on at cards" based on kiebitz "lapwing, pewit (bird)" by onomatopoeia (sound imitation). "Kibitz" itself may be imitative of a bird chirping to emphasize the fact that it refers to someone who talks annoyingly.

—Dr. Language, yourDictionary.com

[D. Allan]

astute • \uh-STOOT\ • adjective

*1 : having or showing shrewdness and perspicacity

2 : crafty, wily

Example Sentence:

The candidate made a number of astute observations about both foreign and domestic policy during the debate.

Did you know?

"Astute" is similar in meaning to "shrewd" and "sagacious," but there are subtle differences in connotation among them. All three suggest sharp thinking and sound judgment, but "shrewd" stresses practical, hardheaded cleverness and judgment ("a shrewd judge of character"), whereas "sagacious" implies wisdom and foresight combined with good judgment ("sagacious investors"). "Astute," which derives from the Latin noun "astus," meaning "craft," suggests cleverness, mental sharpness, and diplomatic skill ("an astute player of party politics").

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

-- Merriam-Webster Online

[D. Allan]

umbra • \UM-bruh\ • noun

1 : a shaded area

*2 a : a conical shadow excluding all light from a given source; specifically : the conical part of the shadow of a celestial body excluding all light from the primary source b : the central dark part of a sunspot

Example Sentence:

*During the lunar eclipse, the moon was in the umbra of the earth's shadow for about 90 minutes.

Did you know?

The Latin word "umbra" ("shade, shadow") has given English a range of words in addition to "umbra" itself. An umbrella can provide us with shade from the sun. So can an umbrageous tree. (In this case, "umbrageous" means "affording shade.") The connection to shade or shadow in other "umbra" words is less obvious. When we say someone takes "umbrage," we mean they take offense, but in times past people used the word as a synonym of "shade" or "shadow." The two senses of "umbrage" influenced "umbrageous," which can mean "inclined to take offense easily" as well as "affording shade."

-- Merriam-Webster Online

[Gail]

Not quite the same as the proverbial slippery slope, but close! Gail

Word of the Day: Declivity (noun)

Pronunciation: [dê-'kli-vê-tee]

Definition: A downward slope.

Usage: Several adjectives are related to today's noun; the two most common are "declivous" [dê-'kLI-vês] and "declivitous" [dê-'kli-vê-tês], currently the more popular of the pair. The antonym is acclivity "upward slope," whose adjective is "acclivitous."

Suggested Usage: Today's word plays a major role in geological descriptions, "Truman lived and died on the Eastern declivity of Mount St. Helens." However, other types of descriptions can often accommodate it, too, "Their relationship has been in a declivitous state since the evening he lifted her cat from the couch by its tail."

Etymology: From Latin declivitas "slope, declivity" from declivis "sloping downhill" comprising de- "(away) from" + clivus "slope." Related to "climate" via Greek klima "surface of the earth, region." The zero grade form of the same root, i.e. *kli-, gave us "lid" from Old English hlid "cover" derived from Germanic *hlid- "that which bends over, cover." Suffixed with -n, the same root became English "lean" from Old English hlinian "to lean" and with -ent, it produced Latin cliens, clientis "dependent, follower," the source of English "client." Finally, another suffixed form evolved into "ladder" from Old English hlædder "ladder," whose trail leads to Germanic *hlaidri-.

—Dr. Language, yourDictionary.com

[Gail]

Here is a handy word- Gail

Word of the Day: Cacoepy (noun)

Pronunciation: [kæk-'o-ê-pee or 'kæk-o-e-pee]

Definition: Incorrect pronunciation.

Usage: Occasionally, we need words we have long since abandoned or that have abandoned us. We may be facing a period in our history now when we need to retrieve "cacoepy" from our lexical attic. "Cacoepy" is not to be confused with cacology "bad choice of words." The antonym of "cacoepy" is orthoepy "the correct pronunciation of words." "Cacoepistic" is the adjective form of today's word and a person who often mispronounces words is a "cacoepist.

Suggested Usage: We think that such a ten-dollar word (the legendary "fifty-cent word" adjusted for inflation) as today's ought to be reserved for those who consistently get it wrong. "The Cacoepist-In-Chief mispronounced word after word, even making up a few, leading one newspaper to ask 'Hain't English his Native Lingo?'"

Etymology: The first part of today's word comes from the Greek kakos "bad." The PIE root is kakka- "to defecate." Words like "poppycock" and "cacophony" have their origins in the same root. The second half, -epy, is from Greek: epos "song, word." Its PIE root is wekw-, which also turns up in "vocal," "voice," "invoke" and "vote."

—Dr. Language, yourDictionary.com

[Gail]

Word of the Day: Quiddity (noun)

Pronunciation: ['kwi-dê-ti]

Definition: (1) The essential nature of a thing, its character; (2) a trivial issue, a quibble.

Usage: "Quiddity" is a little oddity proving the fluidity of the English idiom. It is odd because, like "sanction" and "cleave," its two meanings seem to be antonyms, referring to the most important and the least important aspects of a thing. It comes with an odd little verb, too, "quiddle," which means only to chatter over trifles. Are you ever a quiddler? The plural is as to be expected, "quiddities." (For the relation to "quibble," see the Etymology below.)

Suggested Usage: Today's word is what Richard Lederer (Crazy English 1989) calls a contranym, a word with two contradictory meanings. On the one hand, it refers to the essential thing, "The quiddity of his intentions became evident when he asked if she would mind paying for the engagement ring." On the other hand, it refers to a triviality: "Irving is quite a quiddling quitter." This makes multiple uses in the same phrase possible, if not advisable: "Can we get past the quiddities and down to the quiddities of the issue?" That should send them off to their dictionaries (or you off to a mental institution).

Etymology: Today's word comes from Medieval Latin "quidditas" based on quid "what," as in quid pro quo "something for something" and a recent word in our series, "quidnunc." We have mentioned before that the interrogative pronouns of all Indo-European languages come from the same root, *kwo-, which loses its [k] sound in some languages and its [w] sound in others. The sound [k] became [h] in English, so "what," "where," and "who" all come from this source is Russian chto "what," kto "who," and kuda "where to." Latin maintained both initial sounds, spelling them [qu]: qui [kwi] "who, what." The dative-ablative plural of this pronoun is quibus "to/from what," which we find in "quibble."

–Dr. Language, YourDictionary.com

[Gail]

I currently have one of these at my house- Gail

Word of the Day: Hoghenhine (noun)

Pronunciation: ['hah-gên-hIn]

Definition: (English Medieval Law) A legal member of one's own family; a visitor who remains past the third night or the third night of a visit itself in someone else's home.

Usage: According to "The Country Justice" by Michael Dalton (1655): "…a stranger, or he which cometh guest-wise to an house, and there lieth the third night, is called an Hoghenhine (or Agenhine) and after the third night he is accounted one of his family in whose house he so lyeth: and if he offend the Kings peace, his [H]Oast must be answerable for him." It was the custom for travelers to spend the night in strangers' homes along their journey. However, under medieval English law, if someone stayed three nights, he was presumed not to be a stranger and hence a legal member of the family, a hoghenhine. This meant that the host was liable for his misbehavior as he was for members of his own family.

Suggested Usage: Here is another recondite but intriguing piece of English linguistic history probably better left undisturbed. However, if you find its attraction simply irresistible, you might try something like this: "No hoghenhine of mine would ever do such a thing!" Keep in mind, however, it refers to your immediate family plus any guest staying with you three days or more. "All our hoghenhine are in bed by 11 P.M."

Etymology: Old English aghen "own" + hine "servant, boy." No one has really cared enough to explore this word any further than this. However, we can point to "aghen" as a link between the English derivative, "own," and German eigen 'own," which retains the [g]. Both are related to Gothic aigin "property," i.e. what one owns.

—Dr. Language, yourDictionary.com

[Gail]

Word of the Day: Gallivant (verb)

Pronunciation: ['gæl-ê-vænt]

Definition: (Colloquial) To gad about in a showy fashion; to travel more to be seen than for the given purpose of the travel. To travel about looking for fun and pleasure.

Usage: The word is colloquial and most often used humorously. It is particularly popular in the southern U.S. but is used widely elsewhere, as the Oxford English Dictionary attests. The noun is "gallivanting" but few other derivatives of this verb are used.

Suggested Usage: This good-natured critique of a show-off is useful at work and play: "Pearl has been gallivanting all over town in her new silk dress. You would think she paid $1,000 for it." We all know guys this verb works with, too, "His favorite pastime is gallivanting; he thinks he is the last ray of sunlight on earth."

Etymology: This word's origins are as mysterious as Dr. Language's. It is probably a humorous extension of "gallant" since it rather reflects the behavior of gallants. If so, it goes back to Old French galant, the present participle of galer "to rejoice." This word is ultimately of Germanic origin, based on the ancient root *wel- that we find in "well" and "wealth" today. The same root went directly into Latin as the adverb volup "pleasing" and voluptas "pleasure."

—Dr. Language, yourDictionary.com

[D. Allan]

nonchalant • \nahn-shuh-LAHNT\ • adjective

: having an air of easy unconcern or indifference

Example Sentence:

Colette was amazed that Ryan could remain so nonchalant after being informed that he had won the scholarship.

Did you know?

Since "nonchalant" comes ultimately from Latin words meaning "not" and "be warm," it's no surprise that the word is all about keeping one's cool. The French word "nonchalant," which we borrowed around 1734, has essentially the same meaning as our English word and was derived in Old French from a verb, "nonchaloir," which meant "to disregard." "Nonchaloir" in turn combines the negative "non-" with "chaloir," which means "to concern" and comes from the Latin "calēre" ("to be warm"). "Unconcerned" is one synonym of "nonchalant," along with "casual," "complacent," and "insouciant."

Merriam-Webster Online

[Gail]

Word of the Day: Panglossian (adjective)

Pronunciation: [pæn-'glah-si-ên]

Definition: Blindly and naively optimistic.

Usage: Today's word provides a way to shorten conversations by condensing "overly-optimistic and naïve" into a single word. The adjective may be also used freely as a noun, "Nothing distresses Rita; she is an eternal panglossian." It has a non-identical twin, "panglossic," which offers the advantage of an adverb, "panglossically." The noun is "panglossism," taken directly from "Pangloss" (see Etymology).

Suggested Usage: Panglossians are generally pleasant company, since they are deaf to bad news. However, the attitude does not fit all circumstances: "Trey Sample is so panglossian as to think that the major impact of the Inquisition was to improve the living standards of rack and gallows makers." Since youth is highly susceptible to the attitude, household uses for today's word abound, "I hope you are not so panglossian as to think that your devastation of my petunias with the lawn-mower this afternoon will pass unnoticed."

Etymology: Today's word is based on the name of Pangloss, the tutor in Voltaire's 'Candide' (1759) who believes, in Candide's words, "that all is right when all goes wrong." Voltaire created the name from Greek pan "all, whole" + glossa "language, tongue." The adverb "pan" also appears in English panoply (from Greek pan + opla "all arms"), panorama (from Greek pan + orama "whole view") and panther (may be from Greek pan + ther "all animal"). The stem in "glossa" is also found in English "gloss" and "glossary," and a variant occurs in glottis "vocal cords" and polyglot, which refers to a speaker of several languages—not to be confused with a linguist, someone who studies language scientifically.

—Dr. Language, yourDictionary.com

[D. Allan]

aghast • \uh-GAST\ • adjective

: struck with terror, amazement, or horror : shocked

Example Sentence:

In an effort to impress his date, Adam ordered the most expensive items on the menu, then was aghast when the bill arrived.

Did you know?

If you are aghast, you might look like you've just seen a ghost, or something similarly shocking. "Aghast" traces back to a Middle English verb, "gasten," meaning "to frighten." "Gasten" (which also gave us "ghastly," meaning "terrible or frightening") comes from "gast," a Middle English spelling of the word "ghost." "Gast" also came to be used in English as a verb meaning "to scare." That verb is now obsolete, but its spirit lives on in words spoken by the character Edmund in Shakespeare's King Lear: "gasted by the noise I made, full suddenly he fled."

Merriam-Webster Online

[D. Allan]

Both today's word and its definition are contained in the title of a Duke Ellington title from the C D The best of duke ellington - the complete rca victor mid-forties recordings.

"Transblucency (A Blue Fog That You Can Almost See Through)"

Although it has not entered the mainstream of our language, we should feel free to use it - and help it along. It could be useful describing among other things the smoke of forest fires to a medium case of depression.

It would be interesting to see how you might use it. So Please Post Your Usage. :-)

[D. Allan]

manqué • (mahng-KAY), adjective

the "ng" is not pronounced, but the preceding vowel is nasalized

: short of or frustrated in the fulfillment of one's aspirations or talents -- used postpositively

Example Sentence:

Clarke has a remarkable gift for drawing, but unless he applies himself, he'll always be an artist manqué.

Did you know?

The etymology of "manqué" is likely to vex left-handers. English speakers picked up "manqué" directly from French more than two centuries ago, and it ultimately comes from Latin "manco," meaning "having a crippled hand." But in between the Latin and French portions of this word's history came the Italian word "manco," which means both "lacking" and "left-handed." Lefties may be further displeased to learn that "manqué" isn't the only English word with a history that links left-handedness with something undesirable. For example, the word "awkward" comes from "awke," a Middle English word meaning both "turned the wrong way" and "left-handed." And the noun "gawk" ("a clumsy stupid person") probably comes from a "gawk" that means "left-handed" in English dialect. - Merriam-Webster.com

[D. Allan]

mollify • \MAH-luh-fye\ • verb

*1 : to soothe in temper or disposition : appease

2 : to reduce the rigidity of : soften

3 : to reduce in intensity : assuage, temper

Example Sentence:

The clerk tried his best to mollify the irate customer.

Did you know?

"Mollify," "pacify," "appease," and "placate" all mean "to ease the anger or disturbance of," although each implies a slightly different way of pouring oil on troubled waters. "Pacify" suggests the restoration of a calm or peaceful state, while "appease" implies the quieting of insistent demands by making concessions; you can appease appetites and desires as well as persons. "Placate" is similar to "appease," but it often indicates a more complete transformation of bitterness to goodwill. "Mollify," with its root in Latin "mollis," meaning "soft," implies soothing hurt feelings or anger.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

-Merriam-Webster Online

[D. Allan]

octothorpe • \AHK-tuh-thorp\ • noun

: the symbol #

Example Sentence:

Barry noticed the pound sign on the telephone and remarked about how much the octothorpe resembled a tic-tac-toe grid.

Did you know?

Stories abound about who first called the # sign an "octothorpe" (which can also be spelled "octothorp"). Most of those tales link the name to various telephone workers in the 1960s, and all claim the "octo-" part refers to the eight points on the symbol, but the "thorpe" remains a mystery. One story links it to a telephone company employee who happened to burp while talking about the symbol with co-workers. Another relates it to the athlete Jim Thorpe, and a third claims it derives from an Old English word for "village." If the plethora of theories leaves your head spinning, you might want to take the advice of the wag who asked (poetically), "Can we simply just say, / Ere it spoils your day, / It's the thorp between seven and nine?"

-Merriam-Webster online

[D. Allan]

peripeteia • \pair-uh-puh-TEE-uh\ • noun

: a sudden or unexpected reversal of circumstances or situation especially in a literary work

Example Sentence:

In the last act of the play, the king's decision to avenge his brother leads to a peripeteia that leaves him bereft of his throne and his family.

Did you know?

"Peripeteia" comes from Greek, in which the verb "peripiptein" means "to fall around" or "to change suddenly." It usually indicates a turning point in a drama after which the plot moves steadily to its denouement. In his Poetics, Aristotle describes peripeteia as the shift of the tragic protagonist's fortune from good to bad—a shift that is essential to the plot of a tragedy. The term is also occasionally used of a similar change in actual affairs. For example, in a June 7, 2006 article in The New York Times, Michael Cooper described William Weld's second term as Massachusetts' governor as "political peripeteia": it "began with a landslide victory and ended with frustrated hopes and his resignation."

-Merriam-Webster Online

[D. Allan]

commove • \kuh-MOOV\ • verb

*1 : to move violently : agitate

2 : to rouse intense feeling in : excite to passion

Example Sentence:

"He who has seen the sea commoved with a great hurricane, thinks of it very differently from him who has seen it only in a calm." (R.L. Stevenson, The Silverado Squatters)

Did you know?

Eighteenth-century English lexicographer Samuel Johnson declared "commove" as being "not in use," but the word had not really disappeared from the language; it was simply, at that time, popular primarily with Scottish writers. The 14th-century poet Geoffrey Chaucer is credited with the first use of "commove," and many writers since have used the word, including Sir Walter Scott and George Eliot. Though not so common today, "commove" does occasionally pop up (to the chagrin of Johnsonians). "Market values tend to commove over time," read one such recent example, which appeared in the February 2007 issue of The Journal of Banking and Finance.

*Indicates the sense illustrated in the example sentence.

- Merriam-Webster Online

[D. Allan]

stoozing n.

The practice of borrowing money from a credit card during the card's introductory no-interest period and then investing that money to earn the interest as a profit.

—stoozer n.

—stooze n.

Example Citations:

The essence is simple: if credit card companies will lend money at 0%, you can borrow it and then save it at a high interest rate so you're earning money on cash they have lent you for free. My fondest stoozing memory is being lent thousands of pounds on Egg's credit card only to shove it into Egg's savings account, so it paid me hundreds of pounds in interest on its own money.

The largest stooze I've heard of was £ 80,000 of debt put into an offset mortgage, netting that stoozer nearly £ 5,000 a year in reduced interest payments. ...

Card providers have introduced balance-transfer fees when debts are shifted to interest-free offers, but cards offering 0% on purchases escape the fees, making them the core equipment for building your "stooze-pot".

—Martin Lewis, "Get £ 1,200 of free money on your plastic," Sunday Times, May 13, 2007

"Stooze" is derived from the nickname of an online financial adviser who developed the practice of taking advantage of the introductory interest-free period offered by credit card companies to borrow money for investing profitably elsewhere.

—Ruth Wajnryb, "The explosion of the English tongue," Sydney Morning Herald, February 24, 2007

-Word Spy

[D. Allan]

denegation • \den-ih-GAY-shun\ • noun

: denial

Example Sentence:

"The defendant's actions," the lawyer argued, "led to the denegation of my client's rights as a citizen."

Did you know?

Even if we didn't provide you with a definition, you might guess the meaning of "denegation" from the "negation" part. Both words are ultimately derived from the Latin verb "negare," meaning "to deny" or "to say no," and both first arrived in English in the 15th century. "Negare" is also the source of our "abnegation" ("self-denial"), "negate" ("to deny the truth of"), and "renegade" (which originally referred to someone who leaves, and therefore denies, a religious faith). Even "deny" and "denial" are "negare" descendants. Like "denegation," they came to us from "negare" by way of the Latin "denegare," which also means "to deny."

- Merriam-Webster Online

[D. Allan]

williwaw • \WILL-ih-waw\ • noun

*1 a : a sudden violent gust of cold land air common along mountainous coasts of high latitudes b : a sudden violent wind

2 : a violent commotion

Example Sentence:

The sailors had all heard stories of ships capsized by the williwaws that plagued the strait.

Did you know?

In 1900, Captain Joshua Slocum described williwaws as "compressed gales of wind . . . that Boreas handed down over the hills in chunks." To unsuspecting sailors or pilots, such winds might seem to come out of nowhere -- just like word "williwaw" did some 150 years ago. All anyone knows about the origin of the word is that it was first used by writers in the mid-1800s to name fierce winds in the Strait of Magellan at the southern tip of South America. The writers were British, and indications are that they may have learned the word from British sailors and seal hunters. Where they got the word, we cannot say.

*Indicates the sense illustrated by the example sentence.

- Merriam-Webster online