Sunday, October 25, 2009
Week 10
Let's get back to vocabulary! I was reading a piece in Newsweek and a fabulous word popped out of an article: shoal. Shoal is a shallow patch of water or a large number of people/fish, and a favorite word of mine that Macbeth uses in one of this great soliloquies. It's an older word, one used less often these days, but it's presence in the article made me keep reading. So, look for some awesome vocabulary, a word or two or three that really zing from the page.
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"Just as some men can’t ingratiate themselves through sports, some women can."
I have never heard of the word "ingratiate" before this. After looking it up, I found that it means "to bring oneself into favor with someone by flattering or trying to please them." I think that Dowd used this word interestingly and it added to the strength of her essay.
"... previously cyclical economy"
cyclical: occurring in cycles, regularly repeated.
I had heard this term before, but never really knew what it meant. Now I know!
"And whenever we try to do it for them, whenever we want it more than they do, we fail and they languish."
I had heard the term "languish" before, but wasn't positive exactly what it meant, and what distinction Friedman was making between America's failure in these situations and other groups' languishing. I found that to languish means "to become weak or feeble, to lose vitality," and also "to undergo neglect."
"a force that both chastened and exalted her"
I LOVED this. First of all, the juxtaposition between chastened and exalted was great. Then, on top of that, to use such specific words. Awesome.
Chastened= restrained; subdued
Exalted= exaggerated; inflated
"agri-hotties"
That's a good made-up word. It doesn't make sense out of context though. Basically, her idea is that farmers are suddenly being portrayed as cool and, according to the Huffington Post, sexy. People voted on their favorite photo of a hot farmer -- agri-hotties. I enjoy making up situational words and this one just made me really happy.
Besotted
"On the other hand, many women who had especially besotted and doting fathers never get over the experience."
This sentence caught my attention because it seems paradoxical. I had a general understanding of what the sentence meant because I know what ‘doting’ means, but looking up ‘besotted’ gave the sentence more meaning. ‘Besotted’ means ‘strongly infatuated’ or ‘intoxicated.’ I like the association between these two meanings as well of the sound of the word itself. The associations created by using the word ‘besotted’ added complexity to the sentence, without making the sentence too difficult to understand.
"The fourth annual World’s Worst Polluted Places report, by the nonprofit Blacksmith Institute, based in New York, lauded remediation efforts under way in some of the most environmentally troubled places on earth..."
The word lauded was an interesting choice to me. I like the sound of the word, and it is a bit stronger verb than praised.
"But the political argument against focusing on the deficit is even stronger than he realizes — because there are very good odds that even if Obama exhibited iron fiscal discipline, voters wouldn’t notice."
Iron Fiscal Displine
I have a very small vocabulary so I actually looked up fiscal. It is now one of my new favorite words. It means financial responsibility; I love how that meaning was able to be put into such a short and sweet word. Then, I love the way Krugman made the word even stronger by putting iron before and discipline after.
". . . never-ending cavalcade of Walmart-ready tchotkes . . ."
cavalcade: a formal procession of people walking, on horseback or riding in vehicles
I have never heard this word before and I love the specificity of it.
tchotkes (he either meant to spell "tchotchke" or his is a different spelling): a knickknack or trinket
I obviously know this word but I have never seen it spelled out on the page.
"...barring astoundingly self-defeating behavior..."
Much of the article used tired vocab, but this phrase jumped out to me because of the absolute precision of the words. Only an incompetent nincompoop of a party would do what Dionne speaks of, so the phrase is very well used.
"Waves of money are sloshing through the system,"
SLOSHING. Best word ever.
"And so the disheartenedness of the leadership class"
disheartenedness is a crazy word.
"evince"
I had to look it up, great word.
"As if seniority exempted him from censure"
I did not know what censure meant upon reading this, but after looking it up I can appreciate how it works in the sentence.
The author also used the word "unscathed" in describing her father's state after many close-call car accidents. I have always liked the word, and it was perfect in this situation.
Towards the end, the author describes "swiping" her father's keys, ensuring he can never wreak havoc on the road again. I love how she didn't just take the keys, or grab them - she swiped them.
"...that makes less sense in a modern world than in the agrarian (and unairconditioned) one in which it was first created."
agrarian: Relating to or concerning the land and its ownership, cultivation, and tenure.
"...which has the auxiliary benefit of reducing the rate of car accidents by teen drivers"
auxiliary: additional; supplementary; reserve:
"The controversy pitted those who blame declining happiness on too much change against those who blame it on too little change."
I really liked how she used the word "pitted". There wasn't a lot of extreme vocabulary in this specific column, but this sentence jumped out at me because I have never heard pitted being used in this way before.
"Sure, before the '20s, certain laws excluded Chinese or classes of "undesirable aliens" such as paupers or anarchists, but it was the imposition of comprehensive numerical limits that gave us the modern "illegal immigrant."
I looked up the word "pauper." This word has a nice, old world charm to it which I found intriguing. It is the latin root of poor, and means the same thing.
"galvanizing effect of breakind down corporate hierarchies."
First of all, i just love the sound of the word galvanizing and also its meaning is to stimulate with action which also livens the text and got me excited for the rest of the sentence. And then Brotman uses corporate hierarchies which adds zing and and an unusual pairing between the two words. I love it!
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