LOQUACIOUS

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Dr. Goodword
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LOQUACIOUS

Postby Dr. Goodword » Mon Sep 11, 2006 8:49 pm

• loquacious •

Pronunciation: lo-kway-shês • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Adjective

Meaning: Very talkative, chatty, using lots of words, verbose.

Notes: The noun from today's word is loquacity [lo-qwæ-sê-ti] and the adverb loquaciously. A related adjective is loquent "talking, speaking", which turns up mostly in technical writing as in, "Do chimpanzees comprise a loquent species?" This adjective yields a noun, loquency "talk, the ability to speak". The synonym of today's word, talkative, is an accepted lexical violation in that it is made up of a native stem, talk, plus a Latin suffix -ative, two grammatically incompatible constituents. But perhaps I am waxing loquacious myself and should stop here to leave room for a few other comments on this interesting word.

In Play: Today's word is the antonym of an earlier Good Word, reticent "taciturn, untalkative". "Molly was such a reticent child but since starting school she has become positively loquacious." Loquacity can be fun and entertaining or it can get in the way: "We want to keep today's meeting short, so I may interrupt anyone who becomes too loquacious."

Word History: Today's Good Word goes back to a Latin word with a similar meaning, loquax (loquac-s) from loqui "to speak". It derives from the PIE root *tolkw- which apparently metathesized to *tlokw- (where the [t] could not be pronounced) in Latin. Eloquent and elocution come from eloqui "to speak out" a reduction of ex "out (of)" + loqui "to speak". In Russian we find it unmetathesized in tolk "sense", whose plural is, oddly, tolki "talk, rumors." Although it looks very much like English "talk," the [t] in this stem would have become [th] in English as the contrast Latin pater : English father shows. Talk probably comes from an original word meaning "count", as does Dutch taal "language". (We are always happy when the talkative Katy Brezger talks to us into running a wonderful word like today's Good Word.)
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Perry
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Postby Perry » Mon Sep 11, 2006 10:17 pm

We are always happy when the talkative Katy Brezger talks to us into running a wonderful word like today's Good Word.
And yet, she has been rather reticent lately. What's up Katy? Have the buggies you alude to from time to time (the ones with legs, not the ones with wheels) put you off your feed?
"Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening all at once. Lately it hasn't been working."
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