Word of the day

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Re: Word of the day

Post by macliam » Sat Aug 01 2020 6:55pm

I think there might be a degree of US-centric myopia at play with the definition.

There is a smilar word "bonança" in Portuguese, used in the saying "depois da tempestade, vem a bonança", meaning "after the storm, comes the calm" so I thought I'd look it up there. According to those sources it comes from the ibero-latin "bonancia" although there is some dispute as to whether it passed directly to Portuguese, or via the Castilian "Bonanza"... with some suggesting the reverse as the Portuguese had earlier maritime experience.

Either way.... the word may have got into American English from Mexico, but it isn't a "Mexican Spanish" word. The use of "bonança" in Portuguese placenames also suggests usage far earlier than the first recorded use in the US in the 1820s. Whether it was used in English before that date I can't see (as with many things, obscured by our cousins' big feet all over t'net!)
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Re: Word of the day

Post by BeautifulSunshine » Sun Aug 02 2020 12:51am

For anyone like me who doesn't know what myopia is:
Nearsightedness (myopia) is a common vision condition in which you can see objects near to you clearly, but objects farther away are blurry. It occurs when the shape of your eye causes light rays to bend (refract) incorrectly, focusing images in front of your retina instead of on your retina.
Source and more info:
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-con ... r%20retina.
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Re: Word of the day

Post by macliam » Sun Aug 02 2020 4:09am

AAAlphaThunder wrote:
Sun Aug 02 2020 12:51am
For anyone like me who doesn't know what myopia is:
Nearsightedness (myopia) is a common vision condition in which you can see objects near to you clearly, but objects farther away are blurry. It occurs when the shape of your eye causes light rays to bend (refract) incorrectly, focusing images in front of your retina instead of on your retina.
Source and more info:
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-con ... r%20retina.
Unfortunately, this literal definition of myopia entirely misses the accepted figurative use of the term. In this context, myopia is a focus on what the person wishes to see, at the expense of anything else.... or ignoring the wider implications of something by focusing on only one aspect.

See: https://www.enotes.com/homework-help/wh ... ean-301502
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Re: Word of the day

Post by BeautifulSunshine » Sun Aug 02 2020 7:39am

macliam wrote:
Sun Aug 02 2020 4:09am
AAAlphaThunder wrote:
Sun Aug 02 2020 12:51am
For anyone like me who doesn't know what myopia is:
Nearsightedness (myopia) is a common vision condition in which you can see objects near to you clearly, but objects farther away are blurry. It occurs when the shape of your eye causes light rays to bend (refract) incorrectly, focusing images in front of your retina instead of on your retina.
Source and more info:
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-con ... r%20retina.
Unfortunately, this literal definition of myopia entirely misses the accepted figurative use of the term. In this context, myopia is a focus on what the person wishes to see, at the expense of anything else.... or ignoring the wider implications of something by focusing on only one aspect.

See: https://www.enotes.com/homework-help/wh ... ean-301502
You are very well educated. English isn't my first language and I will take your better knowledge on the matter as true.
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Re: Word of the day

Post by Richard Frost » Sun Aug 02 2020 9:32am

SUNDAY, AUGUST 02, 2020 - https://www.dictionary.com/e/word-of-the-day/

sororal

[ suh-rawr-uhl, -rohr- ]
adjective

of, relating to, or characteristic of a sister or sisters; sisterly.

WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF SORORAL?
Sororal means simply “relating to one’s sister or sisters; sisterly.” It derives from the Latin noun soror “sister” and the English adjective suffix -al, which ultimately comes from the Latin suffix -ālis. Soror comes from Proto-Indo-European swésor- “sister,” in Latin going through the stages from swesor to swosor to sworor to soror. Swésor- appears in Sanskrit as svásar-, in Greek as éor (Greek from preliterate times has had trouble with initial and intervocalic s and w, let alone the cluster sw-, all of which usually became h in classical Greek and disappeared in Hellenistic and later Greek). The form swésōr becomes siur in Old Irish and chwaer in Welsh. The Germanic variant swestar yields Gothic swistar, Old Norse systir, which influenced Old English sweostor and suster to become English sister. Sororal entered English in the mid-17th century.

HOW IS SORORAL USED?
Greta Gerwig’s take on Louisa May Alcott’s novel is intelligent and fleet, refreshing if not radical, and as organic in its feminist convictions as it is in its depiction of close-knit sororal love. - PHILIPPA SNOW, "THE REINVENTION OF LITTLE WOMEN," THE NEW REPUBLIC, JANUARY 1, 2020

Eva Kor describes having the same sort of sororal telepathy with her twin, Miriam Czaigher. … each seemed to know when the other was in special need. -WINIFRED GALLAGHER, "TO THE MANNER BORN," ROLLING STONE, NOVEMBER 19, 1987
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Word of the day

Post by Richard Frost » Mon Aug 03 2020 10:06am

MONDAY, AUGUST 03, 2020 - https://www.dictionary.com/e/word-of-the-day/

vacillate

[ vas-uh-leyt ]
verb (used without object)

to waver in mind or opinion; be indecisive or irresolute: His tendency to vacillate makes him a poor leader.

WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF VACILLATE?
The verb vacillate comes from Latin vacillāt(us), the past participle of the verb vacillāre “(of a person) to be unsteady on one’s feet, stagger, reel; to waver in mind or opinion; (of a thing) to rock, sway, be in an unsound or precarious condition,” which is also used of persons in regard to their financial condition (yet another demonstration that in some respects the ancients were quite modern). Vacillate entered English at the end of the 16th century.

HOW IS VACILLATE USED?
Manfred, who has an unusual ability to vacillate between pugnacious and charming, cajoled owners, stressing the idea that the sport had to have a season. - MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT, "HOW ROB MANFRED NAVIGATED A SUMMER OF PERIL FOR BASEBALL," NEW YORK TIMES, JULY 25, 2020

As state and local governments vacillate between easing and increasing restrictions, normal summer programs may be unavailable, or if open, may be operating at significantly reduced capacities. - ASHLEY T. HIRANO, "DOL ISSUES GUIDANCE ON FFCRA AND SUMMER SCHOOL/CAMP CLOSURES," NATIONAL LAW REVIEW, JUNE 29, 2020
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Re: Word of the day

Post by macliam » Mon Aug 03 2020 2:09pm

Another term where the accepted use now disguises the original meaning.

Vacillate intransitive verb

1. To sway to and fro; to fluctuate or oscillate

By extension

2. To waver in mind; show indecision

From Classical Latin vacillatus, past participle of vacillare, to sway to and fro
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Re: Word of the day

Post by Richard Frost » Tue Aug 04 2020 10:14am

TUESDAY, AUGUST 04, 2020 - https://www.dictionary.com/e/word-of-the-day/

simulacrum

[ sim-yuh-ley-kruhm ]
noun

an effigy, image, or representation: a simulacrum of Aphrodite.

WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF SIMULACRUM?
Simulacrum, “a likeness, an image,” comes straight from Latin simulācrum “a resemblance in sight or sound, an image, a statue (of a god).” Simulācrum is a derivative of the verb simulā(re) “to simulate, pretend” and -crum, a variant of -culum, a suffix denoting tools or instruments. Simulāre in its turn is a derivative of the adjective similis “like, similar,” which through Medieval Latin similāris and Old French similaire becomes English similar. Simulacrum entered English at the end of the 16th century.

HOW IS SIMULACRUM USED?
Except for flakes of plaster in its streets, the little city is entirely undamaged. The simulacrum now more whole than the original. - ANTHONY DOERR, ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE, 2014

A gallery of thumbnail-size co-workers on a laptop screen is a diminished simulacrum of the conference-table gatherings that drive so much of corporate life. - CAL NEWPORT, "WHY REMOTE WORK IS SO HARD—AND HOW IT CAN BE FIXED," THE NEW YORKER, MAY 26, 2020
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Word of the day

Post by Richard Frost » Wed Aug 05 2020 11:00am

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 05, 2020 - https://www.dictionary.com/e/word-of-the-day/

esurient

[ ih-soor-ee-uhnt ]
adjective

hungry; greedy.

WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF ESURIENT?
Esurient, “hungry, greedily hungry, greedy,” comes from Latin ēsuriēns (stem esurient-), the present participle of the verb ēsurīre “to feel hunger, suffer from hunger,” formed from ēs(us), past participle of edere “to eat” and the desiderative suffix -urīre (of unknown origin); thus ēsurīre literally means “to desire to eat.” Esurient may be familiar to those who like Johann Sebastian Bach’s Magnificat (Luke 1:46-55), which contains the verse Ēsurientēs implēvit bonīs et dīvitēs dīmīsit inānēs, “He [God] hath filled the hungry with good things, and the rich He hath sent empty away.” Esurient entered English in the second half of the 17th century.

HOW IS ESURIENT USED?
The whole business of bribing, so far as it is carried on, will fall into disreputable hands, those of untrustworthy, esurient, broken attorneys, who will sell their clients very often … - "THE CORRUPT PRACTICES BILL", THE SPECTATOR, JANUARY 15, 1881

However, this esurient eye for detail can, on rare occasions, cloud the larger picture. -GORDON MARINO, "THE NATURAL," NEW YORK TIMES, SEPTEMBER 30, 2010
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Re: Word of the day

Post by macliam » Wed Aug 05 2020 1:56pm

Monty Python Cheese Shop sketch:

Wensleydale: Good morning, sir.
Mousebender: Good Morning. I was sitting in the public library on Thurmon Street just now, skimming through 'Rogue Herries' by Horace Walpole, when suddenly I came over all peckish.
Wensleydale: Peckish, sir?
Mousebender: Esurient.
Wensleydale: Eh?
Mousebender: (in broad Yorkshire) Eee I were all hungry, like!
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