Word Of The Day

• reverberate
• 
• \rih-VER-buh-rayt\

• DEFINITION

verb

1

: to reflect or to become reflected

2

: to continue in or as if in a series of echoes : resound

• EXAMPLES

The sound of footsteps reverberated through the hallway.

"We take some comfort knowing that the guy who ran the backhoe-mounted pavement breaker that created weeks of ear-splitting din was able to feed his family and make his house payment. The money reverberated through the economy and left behind a roadway that will last long after we're gone." — From an editorial in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, February 20, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

The letter sequence "v-e-r-b" in "reverberate" might make you think at first of such word-related brethren as "proverb," "verbal," and "verbose," all of which derive from the Latin noun "verbum," meaning "word." In fact, "reverberate" comes from a much different source: the Latin verb "verberare," meaning "to whip, beat, or lash," which is related to the noun "verber," meaning "rod." "Reverberate" entered the English language in the 15th century, and one of its early meanings was "to beat, drive, or cast back." By the early 1600s it began to appear in contexts associated with sound that repeats or returns the way an echo does.

Word Of The Day

• callous
• 
• \KAL-us\

• DEFINITION

adjective

1

a : being hardened and thickenedb : having calluses

2

a : feeling no emotionb : feeling or showing no sympathy for others : hard-hearted

• EXAMPLES

The company responsible for the fuel leak demonstrated callousdisregard for the welfare of the people who lived downstream.

"One of the most remarkable achievements of Carthage is Cressida Mayfield herself, and how utterly unlikable she remains…. Strong-willed yet sensitive, Cressida has a callousattitude toward others for which Oates peppers the story with vague explanations." —From a book review by Elizabeth Langemak on Philly.com, February 23, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

A callus is a hard, thickened area of skin that develops usually from friction or irritation over time. Such a hardened area often leaves one less sensitive to the touch, so it's no surprise that the adjective "callous," in addition to describing skin that is hard and thick, can also be used as a synonym for "harsh" or "insensitive." Both "callus" and "callous" derive via Middle English from Latin. The figurative sense of "callous" entered English almost 300 years after the literal sense, and Robert Louis Stevenson used it aptly when he wrote, in Treasure Island, "But, indeed, from what I saw, all these buccaneers were as callous as the sea they sailed on."

Word Of The Day

• yen
• 
• \YEN\

• DEFINITION

noun

: a strong desire or propensity : longing; also : urge, craving

• EXAMPLES

Though it has been years since he moved away from home, Johnnie still experiences the occasional yen for his grandmother's cooking.

"The first of the five to enlist was Ford, a devout Irish American Catholic with a yen for the seafaring life." — From a book review by M.G. Lord in the Los Angeles Times (California), February 20, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

Although "yen" suggests no more than a strong longing these days, at one time someone with a yen was in deep trouble indeed. The first meaning of "yen" was an intense craving for opium. The late 19th-century English term evolved from the Cantonese "yīn-yáhn," which itself combines "yīn,” meaning “opium,” and "yáhn," meaning "craving." In English, the Chinese syllables were transformed to "yen-yen" and ultimately abbreviated to simply "yen." Eventually, "yen" was generalized to the more innocuous meaning of "a strong desire," and the link to drug cravings was lost.

Word Of The Day

• adscititious
• 
• \ad-suh-TISH-us\

• DEFINITION

adjective

1

: derived or acquired from something on the outside

2

: supplemental, additional

• EXAMPLES

"We should choose our books as we would our companions, for their sterling and intrinsic merit, not for their adscititious or accidental advantages." — From Charles Caleb Colton's 1832 book Lacon

"I thrilled to crates of chilly hardware—coffee tins of rusty nails and mismatched bolts and nuts, odd attachments, gimcrack, rickrack, and adscititious crap…." — From William Davies King's 2008 book Collections of Nothing

• DID YOU KNOW?

"Adscititious" comes from a very "knowledgeable" family—it ultimately derives from "scire," the Latin verb meaning "to know." "Scire" also gave us "science," "conscience," "prescience" ("foreknowledge"), and "nescience" ("lack of knowledge"). "Adscititious" itself comes to us from "scire" by way of the Latin verb "adsciscere," which means "to admit" or "to adopt." This explains why "adscititious" describes something adopted from an outside source.

Word Of The Day

• infix
• 
• \IN-fiks\

• DEFINITION

noun

: a derivational or inflectional affix appearing in the body of a word

• EXAMPLES

The Philippine language of Tagalog adds infixes such as "-um-" and "-su-" to verbs to convey different tenses and voices.

"As Mark Peters writes, [The Simpsons character Ned] Flanders is 'hyper-holy,' and his infixes sanctify a typically profane process. He is also gratingly cheerful … and diddly perfectly conveys his sunny attitude: murder and dilemma sound a lot less forbidding when infixed as murdiddlyurder and dididdlyemma…." — From Michael Adams' 2009 book Slang: The People's Poetry

• DID YOU KNOW?

Like prefixes and suffixes, infixes are part of the general class of affixes ("sounds or letters attached to or inserted within a word to produce a derivative word or an inflectional form"). Infixes are relatively rare in English, but you can find them in the plural forms of some words. For example, "cupful," "spoonful," and "passerby" can be pluralized as "cupsful," "spoonsful," and "passersby," using "s" as an infix. Another example is the insertion of an (often offensive) intensifier into a word, as in "fan-freakin'-tastic." Such whole-word insertions are sometimes called "infixes," though this phenomenon is more traditionally known as "tmesis."

Word Of The Day

• sallow
• 
• \SAL-oh\

• DEFINITION

adjective

: of a grayish greenish yellow color suggesting sickliness

• EXAMPLES

She decided not to buy the beige blouse because it made her skin look washed-out and sallow.

"Butterfield is perfect in the title role, his sallow complexion, sunken eyes and haunted gaze every inch the angst-ridden lad that Card created on the page." — From a movie review by Derrick Bang in The Davis Enterprise (California), November 1, 2013

• DID YOU KNOW?

There is no hint of sickliness in the etymology of "sallow." The word appears in Old English as "salu" or "salo," and could mean "dusky" or "dark" or "grayish greenish yellow." "Salu" (or "salo") is akin to Old English "sōl" ("dark, dirty"), Old High German "salo" ("murky, dirty gray"), Old Norse "sölr" ("dirty"), and even Sanskrit "sāra" or "sāla," which carries the basic meaning of "dirty gray." "Sallow," however, has for much of its history been used specifically to describe the skin or complexion of one who is unwell.

Word Of The Day

• opusculum
• 
• \oh-PUSK-yuh-lum\

• DEFINITION

noun

: a minor work (as of literature)

• EXAMPLES

The book is a collection of opuscula written by the author between her two major novels.

"Little surprise, then, that McCall Smith has written a kindly, avuncular, contemplative opusculum sharing his enthusiasm with the uninitiated." — From an article by Richard Davenport-Hines inThe Spectator, November 9, 2013

• DID YOU KNOW?

"Opusculum"—which is often used in its plural form "opuscula"—comes from Latin, where it serves as the diminutive form of the noun "opus," meaning "work." In English, "opus" can refer to any literary or artistic work, though it often specifically refers to a musical piece. Logically, then, "opusculum" refers to a short or minor work. ("Opusculum" isn't restricted to music, though. In fact, it is most often used for literary works.) The Latin plural of "opus" is "opera," which gave us (via Italian) the word we know for a musical production consisting primarily of vocal pieces performed with orchestral accompaniment.

Word Of The Day

• smite
• 
• \SMYTE\

• DEFINITION

verb

1

: to strike sharply or heavily

2

a : to kill or severely injure by strikingb : to attack or afflict suddenly and injuriously

3

: to affect as if by striking

• EXAMPLES

Susan jokingly declared that her mother would smite her if she ever went out in the winter with wet hair.

"For 10 years or more I was that guy at work with the order form and the sheepish grin, guilt-tripping colleagues into buying 'discount cards' and inflated-price cookie dough that they didn't want. For me to then turn down the next wave of sheepishly grinning co-workers would be like challenging God to smite me with a lightning bolt just on principle." — From an editorial by Robert Price in the Bakersfield Californian, February 15, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

Today's word has been part of the English language for a very long time; the earliest documented use in print dates to the 12th century. "Smite" can be traced back to an Old English word meaning "to smear or defile" and is a distant relative of the Scottish word "smit," meaning "to stain, contaminate, or infect." In addition to the straightforward "strike" and "attack" senses that we've defined and illustrated above, "smite" also has a softer side. It can mean "to captivate or take"—a sense that is frequently used in the past participle in such contexts as "smitten by her beauty" or "smitten with him" (meaning "in love with him").

Word Of The Day

• timorous
• 
• \TIM-uh-rus\

• DEFINITION

adjective

1

: of a timid disposition : fearful

2

: expressing or suggesting timidity

• EXAMPLES

The study seems to suggests that timorous people suffer from stress more frequently than their more aggressive peers.

"Hwang's quest to prove his daughter died from a workplace-related illness has pitted him against the world's biggest technology company and a largely timorous South Korean media." — From an article by Justin McCurry in The Guardian(London), February 6, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

"Timid" and "timorous" don't just have similar spellings and meanings; they are etymologically related as well. Both words ultimately derive from the Latin verb "timēre," meaning "to fear." The immediate ancestor of "timid" is Latin "timidus" (same meaning as "timid"), whereas "timorous" traveled to Middle English by way of the Latin noun "timor" ("fear") and the Medieval Latin adjective "timorosus." "Timid" may be the more common of the two words, but "timorous" is older. It first appeared in English in the mid-15th century; "timid" came on the scene a century later. Both words can mean "easily frightened" (as in "a timid mouse" or "a timorous child") as well as "indicating or characterized by fear" (as in "he gave a timid smile" or "she took a timorous step forward").

Word Of The Day

• knackered
• 
• \NAK-erd\

• DEFINITION

adjective

: tired, exhausted

• EXAMPLES

She was knackered after a hard day of work and decided not to join us for an evening out.

"But when Shmuel, knackered and self-satisfied, walks into the house after an afternoon's absence of indeterminate length and implausible itinerary, my heart expands in gratitude." — From an article by Leslie Kolbrener in The Forward, July 19, 2013

• DID YOU KNOW?

"Knackered" is derived from the past participle of "knacker," a slang term meaning "to kill," but also "to tire, exhaust, or wear out." The origins of the verb "knacker" are uncertain, but the word is perhaps related to an older noun "knacker," which originally was used to indicate a harness-maker or saddlemaker, and later for buyers of worn-out animals (or their carcasses) and old structures. The origins of the noun "knacker," however, remain obscure. "Knackered" is used on both sides of the Atlantic but is more common among British speakers.

Word Of The Day

• perforce
• 
• \per-FORSS\

• DEFINITION

adverb

: by force of circumstances

• EXAMPLES

The author of the history was a court historian and his account is perforce biased in favor of the aristocracy.

"Beyond an initial campaign or two, European monarchs lack the money to continue their wars and must perforce borrow it from somewhere." — From a blog by Kenneth Anderson on WashingtonPost.com, February 9, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

English speakers borrowed "par force" from Anglo-French in the 14th century. "Par" meant "by" (from Latin "per") and the Anglo-French word "force" had the same meaning as its English equivalent, which was already in use by then. At first, "perforce" meant quite literally "by physical coercion." That meaning is no longer used today, but it was still prevalent in William Shakespeare's lifetime (1564-1616). "He rush'd into my house and took perforce my ring away," wrote the Bard in The Comedy of Errors. The "force of circumstances" sense of "perforce" had also come into use by Shakespeare's day. In Henry IV, Part 2, we find "... your health; the which, if you give o'er to stormy passion, must perforce decay."

Word Of The Day

• rearguard
• 
• \REER-gahrd\

• DEFINITION

adjective

: of or relating to resistance especially to sweeping social forces

• EXAMPLES

"Even as some of API’s own members are inching toward compromise on relatively modest proposals like cap and trade legislation the lobbying group seems to be fighting a rearguardbattle."— From an article by Adam Federman on Counterpunch.org, February 12, 2014

"Democracy seems no better suited than dictatorship to saving rainforests because money talks in both, and from generation to generation, rearguard battles against the devastation have been handed off."— From an article by Edward Hoagland in Harper's, March 2009

• DID YOU KNOW?

As a noun, "rearguard" refers to the soldiers that are stationed at the rear of a body to protect it from attack especially during retreat. (The troops at the front are called the vanguard.) A rearguard action, then, is the defensive or delaying fight waged as resistance against the encroaching enemy. It is through figurative extension that the phrase "rearguard action," and consequently "rearguard" as an adjective, has become applied to other means of indirect resistance, often by a small force against a more powerful one.

Word Of The Day

• orthography
• 
• \or-THAH-gruh-fee\

• DEFINITION

noun

1

a : the art of writing words with the proper letters according to standard usageb : the representation of the sounds of a language by written or printed symbols

2

: a part of language study that deals with letters and spelling

• EXAMPLES

English orthography was not yet regularized in Shakespeare's time, so words often had many different spellings.

"There's no active pro-Russian policy, as there was under the czars or the Soviets—simply a slow creep of money away from education budgets and new laws reinforcing Cyrillic orthographyand the use of Russian in classrooms." — From an article by Britt Peterson in The Boston Globe, February 16, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

"It's a damn poor mind that can only think of one way to spell a word!" That quote, ascribed to Andrew Jackson, might have been the motto of early English spelling. The concept of orthography (a term that derives from the Greek words "orthos," meaning "right or true," and "graphein," meaning "to write") was not something that really concerned people until the introduction of the printing press in England in the second half of the 15th century. From then on, English spelling became progressively more uniform and has remained fairly stable since the 1755 publication of Samuel Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language (with the notable exception of certain spelling reforms, such as changing "musick" to "music," that were championed by Noah Webster).

Word Of The Day

• verboten
• 
• \ver-BOH-tun\

• DEFINITION

adjective

: forbidden; especially : prohibited by dictate

• EXAMPLES

The teacher made clear on the first day of class that the use of electronic devices would be verboten.

"This was not, perhaps, all that surprising since marijuana remains verboten under federal law to this day…." — From a column by James Gill in The Advocate (New Orleans, Louisiana), January 30, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

Despite its spelling, the adjective "verboten" has nothing to do with "verb," or any of the other words in our language related to Latin "verbum." Rather, "verboten" comes from German, which got it from Old High German "farboten," the past participle of the verb "farbioten," meaning "to forbid." ("Forbid" itself derives from Old English "forbeodan," a relative of "farbioten.") "Verboten," which first appeared in English in 1916, is used to describe things that are forbidden according to a law or a highly regarded authority. There also exists a noun "verboten," meaning "something forbidden by authority" (as in "well-established verbotens"), but this use is quite rare and is typically entered only in large, unabridged dictionaries.

Word Of The Day

• hegira
• 
• \hih-JYE-ruh\

• DEFINITION

noun

: a journey especially when undertaken to escape from a dangerous or undesirable situation : exodus

• EXAMPLES

"Shimmering in the sun-flashed dust of ten thousand hoofs, she saw pass, from East to West, across a continent, the greathegira of the land-hungry Anglo-Saxon. " — From Jack London's 1913 novel The Valley of the Moon

"Integrity-and-ingredient-driven spots like Franny's and Frankies 457 Court Street Spuntino promulgated the then-quirky notion that it was worth making the hegira all the way from Manhattan to Brooklyn to eat excellent food." — From an article by Jeff Gordinier in The New York Times, January 1, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

In the year A.D. 622, the prophet Muhammad was forced to flee his native city, Mecca, to escape persecution from those who rejected his message. Muhammad, the founder of Islam, migrated with a number of his followers to Medina, where they were guaranteed protection by local clans. This event, which traditionally marks the beginning of the Islamic era, is known in Arabic as the "Hijra"—literally, "departure." That Arabic term passed into Medieval Latin (where it was modified to "Hegira") and from there it eventually made its way into English. By the mid-18th century, English speakers were using "hegira" for other journeys, too—especially arduous ones.

Word Of The Day

• laissez-faire
• 
• \less-ay-FAIR\

• DEFINITION

noun

1

: a doctrine opposing governmental interference in economic affairs beyond the minimum necessary for the maintenance of peace and property rights

2

: a philosophy or practice characterized by a usually deliberate abstention from direction or interference especially with individual freedom of choice and action

• EXAMPLES

"Laissez-faire is all well and good until something goes wrong." — John Gutfreund, quoted in The New York Times Book Review, April 18, 2010

"The International Olympic Committee said Monday that they were pleased at how athletes were using social media.… 'We take a very laissez-faire attitude,' IOC spokesman Mark Adams says." — From an article by Kelly Whiteside in USA Today, February 11, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

The French phrase "laissez-faire" literally means "allow to do," with the idea being "let people do as they choose." The origins of "laissez-faire" are associated with the Physiocrats, a group of 18th-century French economists who believed that government policy should not interfere with the operation of natural economic laws. The actual coiner of the phrase may have been French economist Vincent de Gournay, or it may have been François Quesnay, considered the group's founder and leader. The original phrase was "laissez faire, laissez passer," with the second part meaning "let (things) pass." "Laissez-faire," which first showed up in an English context in 1825, can still mean "a doctrine opposing governmental interference in economic affairs," but it is also used in broader contexts in which a "hands-off" or "anything-goes" policy or attitude is adopted.

Word Of The Day

• inroad
• 
• \IN-rohd\
• DEFINITION
noun
1
: a sudden hostile incursion : raid
2
: an advance or penetration often at the expense of someone or something — usually used in plural
• EXAMPLES
"We began to find the country thinly inhabited, and the people rather confined to live in fortified towns, as being subject to theinroads and depredations of the Tartars, who rob in great armies…." — From Daniel Defoe's 1719 novel Robinson Crusoe

"Jones is at the crest of a wave of British snowboarders who have been making inroads on a discipline traditionally dominated by Americans." — From an Associated Press article by Will Graves, February 9, 2014
• DID YOU KNOW?
"Inroad" is a combination of "in" and "road," both of which are pretty mundane, as far as words go. But the first—and oldest—meaning of "inroad" hints at a meaning of "road" other than the "way for traveling" one. Beginning back in the days of Old English, "road" referred to an armed hostile incursion made on horseback. ("Raid" comes from this use of "road" and also formerly specified incursions on horseback.) "Road" has lost all of its former violent connotations, and "inroad" is shedding its as well. While inroads are often made at the expense of someone or something, they are at times simply advances, as when an artist is said to be making inroads into a community.

Word Of The Day

• exhort
• 
• \ig-ZORT\

• DEFINITION

verb

: to incite by argument or advice : urge strongly

• EXAMPLES

The celebrity speaker exhorted all citizens to get out and vote on Election Day.

"What I will do is exhort him to come clean about the difference between Windows 8 and Windows RT that directly impacts customers." — From a blog by James Kendrick on ZDNet, February 7, 2014

• DID YOU KNOW?

"Exhort" is a 15th-century coinage. It derives from the Latin verb "hortari," meaning "to incite," and it often implies the ardent urging or admonishing of an orator or preacher. People in the 16th century apparently liked the root "-hort," but they couldn't resist fiddling around with different prefixes to create other words similar in meaning to "exhort." They came up with "adhort" and "dehort." "Adhort" was short-lived and became obsolete after the 17th century. "Dehort" was similar to "exhort" and "adhort" but with a more specific meaning of "to dissuade." It had a better run than "adhort," being used well into the late 19th century, but it is now considered archaic.