Word of the Day

inalienable : adjective (in-AY-lee-uh-nuh-bul

Definition: incapable of being alienated, surrendered, or transferred

Examples:

The American ethos is built on the belief that life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are inalienable rights.

"'Downward Dog' … goes a particularly funny step further by reflecting another truism: People are dogs, too. We also have complicated emotional lives, further complicated by our professional ones. We also seek food. We also seek love. We obsess.… [T]his terrific series works—because it abides by these simple, inalienable truths." — Verne Gay, Newsday, 13 May 2017

Did You Know?

Alien, alienable, inalienable—it's easy enough to see the Latin word alius, meaning "other," at the root of these three words. Alien joined our language in the 14th century, and one of its earliest meanings was "belonging to another." By the early 1600s that sense of alien had led to alienable, an adjective describing something you can give away or transfer to another owner. The word unalienable came about as its opposite, but so did inalienable, a word most likely borrowed into English on its own from French. Inalienable is the more common form today, and although we often see both forms used to modify "rights," it was unalienable that was used in the Declaration of Independence to describe life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

From Merriam Webster's Word of the Day

Word of the Day

cherry-pick

\ CHER-ee-pik \, verb;

1.Informal . to select with great care: You can cherry-pick your own stereo components .

2.Informal . (in retail use) to buy only the sale items and ignore the other merchandise.

Quotes:

It’s easy to cherry-pick silly or ill-considered or factually flawed things he’s said.

-- Hendrick Hertzberg, "Foul Tip," The New Yorker , Jan. 16, 2009

It is only on a second reading that one can see how delicately Sethe cherry-picks what can be told to Denver as the epic triumph of Denver's birth…

-- A.S. Byatt, Toni Morrison, "Introduction," Beloved , 2006

Origin:

Cherry-pick entered English in the 1960s possibly as an extension of the slang term cherry-picker , defined by Railroad Magazine in 1940 as a "switchman, so called because of red lights on switch stands. Also any railroad man who is always figuring on the best jobs and sidestepping undesirable ones."

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Oxford Dictionaries' Shortlist for 2016 Word of the Year

Yesterday, we mentioned that Oxford Dictionaries.com had chosen "post-truth" as its 2016 Word of the Year. Here are some of the other words that made the shortlist while Oxford Dictionaries' staff contemplated the choice for 2016 Word of the Year. 

alt-right (noun)
An ideological grouping associated with extreme conservative or reactionary viewpoints, characterized by a rejection of mainstream politics and by the use of online media to disseminate deliberately controversial content.

Brexiteer (noun, informal)
A person who is in favour of the United Kingdom withdrawing from the European Union.

chatbot (noun)
A computer program designed to simulate conversation with human users, especially over the Internet.

Latinx (noun)
A person of Latin American origin or descent (used as a gender-neutral or non-binary alternative to Latino or Latina).

For a complete list,  click on the Oxford Dictionaries link. For more information about each word, click on the word.

Oxford Dictionaries' 2016 Word of the Year: Post-truth

Oxford Dictionaries announced "post-truth" as its 2016 international Word of the Year. The Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year is a word or expression chosen to reflect the passing year in language. 

post-truth adjective
Relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.

Every year, the Oxford Dictionaries team reviews candidates for word of the year and then debates their merits, choosing one that captures the ethos, mood, or preoccupations of that particular year. Language research conducted by Oxford Dictionaries editors reveals that use of the word post-truth has increased by approximately 2,000% over its usage in 2015.

The concept of post-truth has been in existence for the past decade, but Oxford Dictionaries has seen a spike in frequency this year in the context of the EU referendum in the United Kingdom and the presidential election in the United States.

It has also become associated with a particular noun, in the phrase "post-truth politics." The compound word post-truth exemplifies an expansion in the meaning of the prefix post- that has become increasingly prominent in recent years. Rather than simply referring to the time after a specified situation or event – as in post-war or post-match – the prefix in post-truth has a meaning more like "belonging to a time in which the specified concept has become unimportant or irrelevant." This nuance seems to have originated in the mid-20th century, in formations such as post-national (1945) and post-racial (1971).

"It’s not surprising that our choice reflects a year dominated by highly-charged political and social discourse," says Casper Grathwohl, President of Oxford Dictionaries. "Fuelled by the rise of social media as a news source and a growing distrust of facts offered up by the establishment, post-truth as a concept has been finding its linguistic footing for some time."

Grathwohl goes on to say, ‘"We first saw the frequency really spike this year in June with buzz over the Brexit vote and again in July when Donald Trump secured the Republican presidential nomination. Given that usage of the term hasn’t shown any signs of slowing down, I wouldn’t be surprised if post-truth becomes one of the defining words of our time."

The Word of the Year need not have been coined within the past twelve months. To qualify for consideration we look for evidence that its usage has increased significantly across a broad range of media. On the basis of that evidence, post-truth made it into OxfordDictionaries.com this month.

Post-truth seems to have been first used in this meaning in a 1992 essay by the late Serbian-American playwright Steve Tesich in The Nation magazine. Reflecting on the Iran-Contra scandal and the Persian Gulf War, Tesich lamented that "we, as a free people, have freely decided that we want to live in some post-truth world." 

There is evidence of the phrase "post-truth" being used before Tesich’s article, but apparently with the transparent meaning "after the truth was known," and not with the new implication that truth itself has become irrelevant.

Content from Oxford Dictionaries.com

Word of the Day

Sisyphean \sis-uh-FEE-uhn\,
adjective:

1. endless and unavailing, as labor or a task.
2. of or pertaining to Sisyphus.

Alongside the futile Sisyphean trials of his fellow men, the song of suicide could only beckon. But again, he said no.
-- Claire Messud, The Last Life, 2000

Making himself useful as always, he took upon himself the Sisyphean task of keeping all those Modernist surfaces sparkling.
-- Jeffrey Eugenides, Middlesex, 2002

Sisyphean comes from a Greek myth about the King of Corinth named Sisyphus, who was condemned to eternally roll a stone up a hill. The extension to any laborious, eternal task has been used since the word entered English in the early 1600s.

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Are you a bibliophage? Check out the meaning below to find out.

bibliophage \BIB-lee-uh-feyj\, noun:

An ardent reader; a bookworm.

Sample use:

You may recall, if you are something of a bibliophage, that the late Sylvia Plath had a story with a similar name.
-- Corey Mesler, We Are a Billion-Year-Old Carbon

The borrower, heedless, reckless bibliophage cares nothing about all this; into the midst of these learned pleasures he leaps like a fox into a hen-roost; he is smitten all at once with an overmastering hunger for reading...”
-- Elliot Stock, The Bookworm

Bibliophage derives from the Latin biblio meaning “books” and phage meaning “a thing that devours.”

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animadvert \an-uh-mad-VURT\, verb:

1. To comment unfavorably or critically.
2. Obsolete. To take cognizance or notice of.

I have a proposition which I am desirous of making to Mr. Gilmore, as a magistrate acting in this part of the county. Of course, it is not for me to animadvert upon what the magistrates may do at the bench tomrorrow.
-- Anthony Trollope, The Vicar of Bullhamptom

It is not our business to animadvert upon these lines; we are not critics, but historians.
-- Andrew Lang, The Blue Fairy Book

Animadvert comes from the Latin animadvertere meaning to heed or censure.

From http://dictionary.reference.com/wordoftheday/

Word of the Day

ferly \FER-lee\
noun:
1. Something unusual, strange, or causing wonder or terror.
2. Astonishment; wonder. 
adjective:
1. Unexpected; strange; unusual.

I had had half a thought, at the outset, of telling him about the ferly, my glimpse of the palace. But I couldn't bring myself to it.
-- Clive Staples Lewis and Fritz Eichenberg, Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold.

Lord, ye'll have all the folk staring as if we were some ferly.
-- Margaret Oliphant, Kirsteen

Ferly is derived from Old English fǣrlīc meaning fǣr (fear) and -līc (-ly). It was related to the Germangefährlich meaning dangerous.

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Word of the Day

tractate \TRAK-teyt\, noun:
A treatise; essay.

Divide up all the tractates and commit yourselves to learn them during the coming year.
-- Yair Weinstock, "Holiday Tales for the Soul"

Jean-Pierre Mahé has rightly insisted that we should explore possible explanations other than mere haphazard collection, not only for the presence of the Hermetic tractates within Codex VI…
-- Michael Allen Williams, Rethinking "Gnosticism"

Tractate comes from the Medieval Latin word tractātus meaning "a handling, treatment."

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Word of the Day

holograph \HOL-uh-graf, -grahf, HOH-luh-\,
adjective: wholly written by the person in whose name it appears: a holograph letter.

noun: a holograph writing, as a deed, will, or letter.

The will was holograph, for Mr. Utterson, though he took charge of it now that it was made, had refused to lend the least assistance in the making of it...
-- Robert Louis Stevenson, "Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," 1886

“An unexpectedly thoughtful young man," said Chase, straightening the frame of (Queen Victoria's holograph letter. Originally, he had planned to put the Emerson autograph between those of Longfellow and Tennyson but then he had had second thoughts about keeping a valuable letter addressed not so much to him as the Secretary of the Treasury and so, with a sad heart, he handed it over to the Treasure archives...
-- Gore Vidal, "Lincoln: A Novel," 1984

Holograph entered English in the 18th century from the Greek holos + graph, meaning "whole written."

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Word of the Day

Word of the Day

mammonism \MAM-uh-niz-uhm\, noun:

The greedy pursuit of riches.

We will bring to mind a young man or young woman bitterly awakened from a fancy dream of accomplishment, action or glory, forced instead to come to terms with a considerably reduced status, a betrayed love, and a hideously bourgeois world of crass mammonism and philistine taste. -- Rudyard Kipling, "Kim"

Claiming mutual “affection and confidence” with his collaborating reader whom he expects to agree, Dickens also indicts the false religion of Mammonism. -- Linda M. Lewis, "Dickens, His Parables, and His Readers" 

Mammonism is an odd combination of Aramaic and Greek. The word mammon meant wealth in Aramaic, and the suffix -ism forms a noun from a verb, as in criticism and plagiarism.

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Word of the Day

agnomen \ag-NOH-muhn\,
noun:
 1. A nickname.
2. An additional, fourth name given to a person by the ancient Romans in allusion to some achievement or other circumstance, as “Africanus” in “Publius Cornelius Scipio Africanus.”

He was thin in person and low in stature, with light sandy-colored hair, and small pale features, from which he derived his agnomen of Bean or white. -- Sir Walter Scott, "Waverley"

Successful Roman generals were frequently given an agnomen celebrating the source of their victories. -- Waldo E. Sweet, "Lectiones Primae"

Agnomen comes from the Latin tradition of adding a fourth nickname to someone's given name. Ag- is a variation of the prefix ad- meaning "to" or "near." Nomen means "name."

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Word of the Day for Monday, March 14, 2016

mulligrubs \MUHL-i-gruhbz\,
noun:
Ill temper; colic; grumpiness.

"That's a comfortable place to be." The barber chuckled. "You're a philosopher, sir, a philosopher." "I am, but I'm a blue one. I have the blue mulligrubs."
-- Brian Lynch, "The Winter of Sorrow"

Right Rosa Solis, as ever washed mulligrubs out of a moody brain!
-- Sir Walter Scott, "The Waverley Novels"

It is easy enough to say that a pessimist is a person afflicted with an incurable case of mulligrubs — one whom nothing in all earth or heaven or hades pleases; one who usually deserves nothing, yet grumbles if he gets it.
-- William Cowper Brann, "Beauty and the Beast," Brann: The Iconoclast

This fanciful formation was developed in 1599 as a synonym for 'a fit of the blues' and an alteration of megrims.

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Word of the Day for Thursday, March 10, 2016

solecism \SOL-uh-siz-uhm\, noun:
1. A breach of good manners or etiquette.
2. A nonstandard or ungrammatical usage, as unflammable and they was.
3. Any error, impropriety, or inconsistency.

 To pick a fight with a visiting lord is a solecism, but being caught that way would have put the solecism squarely on Minch's head… -- Joel Rosenburg, Hour of the Octopus

The idea of having committed the slightest solecism in politeness, whether real or imaginary, was agony to him; for perhaps even guilt itself does not impose upon some minds so keen a sense of shame and remorse, as a modest, sensitive, and inexperienced youth feels from the consciousness of having neglected etiquette, or excited ridicule. -- Sir Walter Scott, Waverly

Solecism was originally a toponym for people from the Greek city of Cilicia where a corrupt form of Greek was spoken. It came to mean "a mistake in speaking or writing" in Middle French in the 1500s. The sense of "a breach in manners" was recorded in the early 1600s.

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*Word of the Day for Saturday, March 5, 2016

obscurantism \uhb-SKYOORr-uhn-tiz-uhm\, noun:

1. Opposition to the increase and spread of knowledge.
2. Deliberate obscurity or evasion of clarity.

Of course they're not. That's why there were all those confrontations, all that aggression and obscurantism. Because the forces of darkness are dying, and they are thrown back on such things as a last resort.
-- Paulo Coelho, The Witch of Portobello
In these he had shown himself a stalwart champion of Christian doctrine at its most precise and purest, equally remote from the modern laxity and obscurantism of the past.
-- Albus Camus, The Plague
Obscurantism originally comes from the Latin root obscur meaning “dark” and the suffix -ant which turned a verb into a noun (as in the word servant), so the word literally meant “one that makes dark.”

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Word of the Day for Thursday, February 25, 2016

concatenate \kon-KAT-n-eyt\, verb:
1. To link together; unite in a series or chain.
adjective:
1. Linked together, as in a chain.

While I began to immerse myself in this difficult new venture, the summer would bring in fresh distraction from my loneliness, and it is indeed curious how events concatenate.
-- John O'Meara, "Defending Her Son"

But when, as in this vintage, the conditions concatenate ideally, the result is - I'm sure you'll agree - vivid and appealing.
-- Stephen Fry, "The Liar"

Concatenate stems from the Latin word concatēnātus meaning "to link together."

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Word of the Day

pelagic \puh-LAJ-ik\, adjective:
1. Of or pertaining to the open seas or oceans.
2. Living or growing at or near the surface of the ocean, far from land, as certain organisms.

I was reminded of certain kinds of pelagic birds that move at ease in the air or on the ocean, but have a hard time walking.
-- Ross MacDonald, "The Blue Hammer"

However, the real slaughter, the one that all the maritime nations of the world opposed and strove to abolish, was pelagic sealing, the kind that Schransky particularly enjoyed and from which he profited enormously.
-- James Michener, "Alaska"

Pelagic is derived from the Greek word pélag which meant "the sea."

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Word of the Day

imponderable \im-PON-der-uh-buhl\,
noun:
1. A thing that cannot be precisely determined or measured.
adjective:
1. Not ponderable; that cannot be precisely determined, measured, or evaluated.

Of course he had always been a huge imponderable, if not to say the biggest challenge of her admittedly young life. -- Lindsay Armstrong, "The Constantin Marriage"

Of course there's always the imponderable, the unpredictable which can't be foreseen... -- Leonardo Sciascia, Peter Robb and Sacha Rabinovitch, "The Moro Affair "

Imponderable comes directly from the Medieval Latin word imponderābilis which had the same meaning.

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Word of the Day for Wednesday, February 3, 2016

caparison \kuh-PAR-uh-suhn\,
 verb:
1. To dress richly; deck.
2. To cover with a caparison.
noun:
1. A decorative covering for a horse or for the tack or harness of a horse; trappings.
2. Rich and sumptuous clothing or equipment.

The fruit, the fountain that's in all of us; in Edward; in Eleanor; so why caparison ourselves on top? -- Virginia Woolf, "The Years"

And he followed her order, bridling and saddling the horse and making every effort to caparison it well. -- Chrétien de Troyes, "The Complete Romances of Chrétien de Troyes"

Caparison originally referred to an elaborate covering for horses. It is related to the word chaperon. 

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Word of the Day

ad rem \ad REM\,
adverb:
1. Without digressing; in a straightforward manner.
 adjective:
1. Relevant; pertinent.

I am sure these things are not ad rem. Some persons think, my lord, it is very hard these men should be forced against their consciences from the church. -- Richard Baxter, "The Practical Works of Richard Baxter"

The letter seems free of formulae, which suggests it was composed specifically ad rem. -- Roger Rees, "Layers of Loyalty in Latin Panegyric"

Ad rem is a useful Latin phrase that literally means "at thing" from the roots ad and rēs.

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