Recently Added Articles Page #110

belie - vocabulary

belie - verb To misrepresent, to show to be false; to refute, disprove, gainsay. Often used to show an action directly contrary to the true situation, as in His shaking hands belied his calm smile and voice. Hitler's outward hatred for Jews and Russi...

bemoan - vocabulary

bemoan - verb To lament; to express grief or distress over; to regard with disapproval or regret. Back in May, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton publicly admonished young folks for thinking of work as a "four-letter word," prompting a shaming from her own ...

beset - vocabulary

beset - verb To attack on all sides, to assail, to harass, as in beset by financial difficulties; to surround or hem in, as in the little town beset on all sides with housing developments; to place or set upon, as in the ring beset with diamonds.Note...

bilateral - vocabulary

bilateral - adjective Pertaining to two sides, parties, or factions, as in a bilateral treaty. In law, a bilateral contract binds two parties to reciprocal duties. Recently, President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki signed a joint commu...

blaspheme - vocabulary

blaspheme - verb To speak irreverently of God or sacred things or beliefs; to speak evil of someone or something. Used as either a transitive verb (with object), as in She blasphemed the pastor of her church, or an intransitive verb (without object)...

boorish - vocabulary

boorish - adjective Like a boor, insensitive, crude; without good manners, as in His boorish behavior offended everyone at the party. Today’s New York Times features a story on the boorish and disgusting behavior by large bunches of drunk and rowdy...

cabal - vocabulary

cabal - verb To hatch a scheme, to plot.nounA small group of plotters who hatch a scheme against the government or persons in authority. The word also refers to the scheme itself. But now the British say Santa's corpulence isn't cute, it's a health h...

cacophony - vocabulary

cacophony - noun A harsh and discordant sound; a meaningless mixture of sounds. Poets who know no better rhapsodize about the peace of nature, but a well-populated marsh is a cacophony.—Bern Keating “Birders’ Heaven” Connoisseur, April 1986 N...

calumny - vocabulary

calumny - noun A false and misleading statement designed to destroy the reputation of someone or something; the act of uttering calumnies. It is harder to kill a whisper than even a shouted calumny.—Mary Stewart The Last Enchantment (1979) Note: Yo...

cant - vocabulary

cant - verb To talk in a singsong, preaching, whining tone; to speak tediously with affected solemnity.nounMonotonous speech crammed with platitudes; the special vocabulary of a group or profession; whining speech. All gentle cant and philosophizing ...

captious - vocabulary

captious - adjective One who finds fault, is difficult to please; designed to perplex or confuse, as in captious questions. Pat Oliphant's cartoon is notable because of the classic grace of the lines of the Statue of Liberty. The point is that freedo...

caricature - vocabulary

caricature - noun A picture or depiction that ludicrously exaggerates the features or defects of persons or things. The most perfect caricature is that which, on a small surface, with the simplest means, most accurately exaggerates, to the highest po...

castigate - vocabulary

castigate - verb To criticize harshly; to punish for the purpose of correcting; to reprimand severely. How can you support a policy of racial preferences and then attack one of its supposed beneficiaries as undeserving? This, ultimately, is the intri...

chagrin - vocabulary

chagrin - verb To vex by disappointment or humiliation, as in The defeat chagrined him deeply.nounA feeling of vexation; disappointment or humiliation. Silence is the universal refuge, the sequel to all dull discourses and all foolish acts, a balm to...

charlatan - vocabulary

charlatan - noun A person pretending to have more knowledge or skill than he or she actually possesses; a quack; a flamboyant deceiver. There is hardly any mental misery worse than that of having our own serious phrases, our own rooted beliefs, cari...

circumlocution - vocabulary

circumlocution - noun A roundabout way of speaking, usually using more words than necessary; evasion in speech or writing. Whatever was required to be done, the Circumlocution Office was beforehand with all the public departments in the art of percei...

circumscribe - vocabulary

circumscribe - verb To draw a line around, to encircle, as in to circumscribe a village on a map; to enclose with bounds, to delimit, as in His ambition is circumscribed by his lack of drive and determination. [U]ntil women assume the place in societ...

circumspect - vocabulary

circumspect - adjective Watchful, discreet, cautious, prudent, as in a circumspect investment strategy. I smiled, I waited, I was circumspect; O never, never, never write that I missed life or loving.—Hilda Doolittle “A Dead Priestess Speaks” N...

cogent - vocabulary

cogent - adjective Incisive, analytical, convincing, believable because of a forcible and clear presentation. [C]ider-apples furnish one of the most cogent arguments to prove that Providence had the production of alcoholic liquors directly in its eye...

cognizant - vocabulary

cognizant - adjective Fully informed, aware, conscious.Note: Usually followed by the preposition of, as in He was cognizant of the dangers. In my own view, there are clear differences between child and adult artistic activity. While the child may be ...

colloquialism, colloquial - vocabulary

colloquialism, colloquial - noun Colloquialism: an ordinary or familiar expression; familiar style or usage.adjectiveColloquial: appropriate to or characteristic of ordinary or familiar conversation instead of formal speech or writing. Colloquial poe...

complement, compliment - vocabulary

complement, compliment - verb Complement: to complete, to add to something, to provide something felt to be lacking, as in The two books complemented each other and provided a complete picture of the war.Compliment: to praise or extol, as in She comp...

comport - vocabulary

comport - verb To conduct or behave (oneself), as in He comported himself with dignity; to be in agreement with (usually followed by with), as in Our policy must comport with the principles of free enterprise. Christians, like 12-step group attendees...

compunction - vocabulary

compunction - noun A feeling of anxiety or discomfort caused by regret for doing wrong or causing pain; contrition; remorse; any uneasiness or hesitation about the rightness of an action. Torture, presented with gusto and almost no moral compunction,...

comprise - vocabulary

comprise - verb To include, contain, consist of.Note: Correct, and traditional usage, requires the use of comprise in a way whereby the whole comprises the parts, as in The United States comprises 50 states. Increasingly, writers use the verb in a pa...