• farce • Pronunciation: fahrs • Hear it! Part of Speech: fahrs Meaning: 1. Stuffing, filling, force-meat. 2. An exaggerated parody of base humor, an artistic work with no redeeming social value that usually resorts to slapstick humor. Notes: Today's noun may be used as a verb in its first sense, a...

My answer had been "a high priced courtesan". Brilliant reply and reasoning. So how did we get to the verb “to court,” Again, the legitimate behavior in regal courts. The legal court got its name from the time when royal justice was measured out in regal courts. When the word of a king wa...

• courtesan • Pronunciation: kor -tê-zên • Hear it! Part of Speech: Noun Meaning: 1. A mistress supported by a member of the nobility. 2. A sophisticated prostitute with an elite, if not courtly clientele. Notes: Today's word refers to a highly successful entrepreneuse in the world's oldest profess...

• luftmensch • Pronunciation: luft -mench • Hear it! Part of Speech: Noun Meaning: 1. An airhead, a contemplative person whose head is in the clouds and has little if any idea of practical matters, like earning a living. 2. A petty tradesman, peddler, unsuccessful businessperson. Notes: Today's wor...

• prestige • Pronunciation: pres- teezh • Hear it! Part of Speech: Noun, mass (no plural) Meaning: High level of respect, importance, great influence, high standing in the eyes of others, commanding position. Notes: Here is a French word copied by English so recently (early 19th century) that the F...

• contrary • Pronunciation: kahn -trer-ri • Hear it! Part of Speech: Adjective Meaning: 1. Opposed, counter, extremely divergent. 2. Willful, perverse, tending to be far away from general behavior. Notes: This word is often confused with opposite. Opposite refers to things that are altogether diffe...

• egoist • Pronunciation: ee -go-ist • Hear it! Part of Speech: Noun Meaning: 1. Someone who is conceited, self-centered, wrapped up in him- or herself; a person with an inflated ego. 2. A person who subscribes to the theory of egoism, the philosophy that self-interest is the basis of all morality....

• dehiscent • Pronunciation: dee- hi -sênt • Hear it! Part of Speech: Adjective Meaning: 1. Gaping open, wide open. 2. (Botany) Bursting open at ripening to allow seeds to escape, as 'a plant with dehiscent pods'. Notes: Today's word is the adjective from the verb dehisce "to gape or burst ope...

• continual • Pronunciation: kên- tin -yu-êl • Hear it! Part of Speech: Adjective Meaning: Repeated over a long period of time, continuing at intervals. Notes: Continual is often confused with continuous . However, the meanings of these two words differ significantly and they cannot be used correct...

• bathos • Pronunciation: bay -thos • Hear it! Part of Speech: Noun, mass Meaning: The major dictionaries fail to agree on the meanings of today's word, but they seem to hover about these: 1. Lowest depth, bottom. 2. A dramatic or ludicrous fall from the exalted to the ordinary. 3. Banality, triten...

• flourish • Pronunciation: flê -rish • Hear it! Part of Speech: Verb, noun Meaning: 1. To grow luxuriantly, thrive. 2. To prosper, blossom, succeed excessively, to fare extremely well. 3. To make bold, sweeping movement, brandish, wave boldly. 4. (Noun) A decorative frill, ostentatiously ornamenta...

• ad-lib • Pronunciation: æd-lib • Hear it! Part of Speech: Adjective, adverb, verb, noun Meaning: 1. (Adjective, adverb) Impromptu, spontaneous, as one pleases without preparation. 2. (Verb) To speak or otherwise present spontaneously, without preparation. 3. (Noun) Anything spoken or played spont...

• president • Pronunciation: pre -zê-dênt • Hear it! Part of Speech: Noun Meaning: 1. A person elected or appointed to preside over an organization, the highest ranking member of a management team, as 'the president of the New York Stock Exchange'. 2. The chief officer of the executive branch of a ...

• abrogate • Pronunciation: æb -rê-gayt • Hear it! Part of Speech: Verb, transitive Meaning: 1. To repeal, annul, cancel, or abolish something, such as a law. 2. To obviate, do away with, put an end to. Notes: This word has a large and happy family. The person who abrogates is an abrogator who carr...

• vulgar • Pronunciation: vêl -gêr • Hear it! Part of Speech: Adjective Meaning: 1. Of the unwashed masses, plebian, related to common people, the riff-raff, the hoi-polloi. 2. Common, base, ordinary. 3. Bawdy, foul, immodest, immoral, impure, indecent, indelicate, lascivious, lecherous, lewd, lice...