That (weird) word you love

wayndom · Aug 8, 2007

I got two of 'em:

Penultimate, because it's so weirdly specific and so rarely needed -- it means, "next to last," by the way.

And my all-time weirdest, favormost word (aside from "favormost," which I got from an ex-girlfriend),

Defenestrate

It means, to push or throw from a window. As in, "He spat in a club member's face, whereupon the club member defenestrated him."

On the rare occasions that I've seen this word in use, I always wonder, "When in the course of human history was the practice of pushing people out of windows so common that it needed a word of its own?"

English...ya gotta love it...

reenkam · Aug 8, 2007

wayndom said:
Penultimate, because it's so weirdly specific and so rarely needed -- it means, "next to last," by the way.

There are a lot of times this word would have come in handy for me....I feel like I say "next to last" a lot

I like the word abecedarian...having to do with the alphabet.

The only thing I can think of that's abecedarian is the alphabet itself.

My-Immortal · Aug 8, 2007

I own a book called: Depraved and Insulting English. There are TOO many words in there that would fall into the 'wield words I love' category. Probably even more entertaining is reading the sentences incorporating these uniquely depraved and insulting words...

Two words you wouldn't want to mix up (or accidentally typo)

uxoravalent: / ooks or AHV uh lent / adj: Able to have sex only with one's wife

uxorovalent: /ooks or O vuh lent / adj: Able to have sex only with someone other than one's wife.

LisaHy · Aug 8, 2007

One word I like is 'extrapolate'. I've not yet managed to use it in a novel, but somewhere in the future, I shall have a book titled "Extrapolate This!". Don't know what it's about yet, but I will write it...

Cheers, Lisa.

My-Immortal · Aug 8, 2007

wayndom said:
On the rare occasions that I've seen this word in use, I always wonder, "When in the course of human history was the practice of pushing people out of windows so common that it needed a word of its own?"

English...ya gotta love it...

hamble: verb: to cripple a dog by cutting out the balls of its feet.

As you said above, when was this practice so common that a word was needed for it???

or...

fream: verb: to roar like a wild boar during the rutting season, when he seeks to mate

while others such as:

malversation: noun: corruption in office/misuse of public funds

are still common enough acts but the words aren't commonly used...

English is interesting.

DeadlyAccurate · Aug 8, 2007

Egregious. I love that word. I love penultimate, too. And nigh. That's such a cool word that I had to use it in my last book.

triceretops · Aug 8, 2007

In Journey to the Center of the Earth, where James Mason extricates a beautiful emrald from a formation, he grins at the others and says, "inexplicable." I love it.

Tri

Marlys · Aug 8, 2007

I like coolth, the opposite of warmth. How did we ever let that word drop out of general usage?

DeadlyAccurate · Aug 8, 2007

I just thought of another one. Aplomb. Say it. Aplomb. It almost sounds like an onomatopoeia (and yes, I did have to look up the spelling of that one.)

Red Robin · Aug 8, 2007

Erubiscate (blush) is my favourite. I don't even know if that's in the dictionary. Erubescent is, so why not erubiscate.

Tintinnabulate (ring like a small bell(s) ) That's my second favourite.

I think you ought to use your favourite words in a sentence. Such as -

Tintinnabulation, for some inexplicable reason, caused her to erubiscate.

EriRae · Aug 9, 2007

Red Robin said:
Erubiscate (blush) is my favourite. I don't even know if that's in the dictionary. Erubescent is, so why not erubiscate.

Tintinnabulate (ring like a small bell(s) ) That's my second favourite.

I think you ought to use your favourite words in a sentence. Such as -

Tintinnabulation, for some inexplicable reason, caused her to erubiscate.

Great words; love the sentences

Methinks you writers have a much larger vocabulary than I...

A word I love is sursurus. Marilynne Robinson used it twice in Gilead. I've been listening to the cicadas' sursurus today...damn things keep me awake (to use it in a sentence).

Another word: prosthelytize. My MC, Dolf, often prosthelytizes to his fellow students, trying to get the non-Jews to join his pro Nazi group, the Slayers. I can't believe I haven't written it into my WIP yet...

kristie911 · Aug 9, 2007

My favorite weird word is from my EMT class...I just can't imagine ever working it into my writing.

Diaphoretic: which basically means sweaty

Spiny Norman · Aug 9, 2007

Man, Defenestrate is a really popular word.

MidnightMuse · Aug 9, 2007

Epiphany.

JimmyB27 · Aug 9, 2007

reenkam said:
The only thing I can think of that's abecedarian is the alphabet itself.

I had some nice abecedarian soup the other day.

Ever since I stumbled upon it in the Hardy Boys, I've loved the word 'jalopy'. It might be a really common word in the US, but not so much in the UK.

althrasher · Aug 9, 2007

Anthropomorphize--to ascribe human characteristics to non-human things. I already used it in a post yesterday, but it makes me happy.

alanna · Aug 9, 2007

"splendiforous" ... which I use all the time interchangeably with "swell"

Willowmound · Aug 9, 2007

wayndom said:
On the rare occasions that I've seen this word in use, I always wonder, "When in the course of human history was the practice of pushing people out of windows so common that it needed a word of its own?"

English...ya gotta love it...

Hrm. It's a constructed word, though. You can construct almost any word following standard rules. The prefix "de-" is clear enough, I should imagine. And "fenst" is a word of Germanic root having to do with windows.

The German word for window is fenster. The Swedish word for window is fönster. For instance.The link with English must be there if you look. For English too is a Germanic language.

Let me prove my point by constructing another word, following normal rules: mammofobia. It means "fear of breasts".

reigningcatsndogs · Aug 9, 2007

'smarmy' -- it about says it all when you write about not-nice individuals

Danger Jane · Aug 9, 2007

I don't have any weird words that I love.

Danger Jane · Aug 9, 2007

Willowmound said:
Hrm. It's a constructed word, though. You can construct almost any word following standard rules. The prefix "de-" is clear enough, I should imagine. And "fenst" is a word of Germanic root having to do with windows.

The German word for window is fenster. The Swedish word for window is fönster. For instance.The link with English must be there if you look. For English too is a Germanic language.

Let me prove my point by constructing another word, following normal rules: mammofobia. It means "fear of breasts".

I thought it was from Latin?

fenestra -ae f. [a window; a breach , loophole].

The German might come from the Latin...

1620, "the action of throwing out of a window," from L. fenestra "window." A word invented for one incident: the "Defenestration of Prague," May 21, 1618, when two Catholic deputies to the Bohemian national assembly and a secretary were tossed out the window (into a moat) of the castle of Hradshin by Protestant radicals. It marked the start of the Thirty Years War. Some linguists link fenestra with Gk. verb phainein "to show;" others see in it an Etruscan borrowing, based on the suffix -(s)tra, as in L. loan-words aplustre "the carved stern of a ship with its ornaments," genista "the plant broom," lanista "trainer of gladiators."

De- is a Latin prefix...those (generally) get stuck onto Latin-derived words.

Also wouldn't it be mammophobia?

Willowmound · Aug 9, 2007

Danger Jane said:
I thought it was from Latin?

fenestra -ae f. [a window; a breach , loophole].

Excellent. So it's either of Indo-European origin, or the word was imported straight from Latin at a later stage.

Danger Jane said:
De- is a Latin prefix...those (generally) get stuck onto Latin-derived words.

It certainly makes for a cleaner construction. But in English, de- is so much used, I reckon you can stick it on pretty much anything.

Danger Jane said:
Also wouldn't it be mammophobia?

Yes it would.

Willowmound · Aug 9, 2007

English window comes from "wind-eye" -- an "eye" in the wall to let in, or shut out, the wind.

'S true.

Danger Jane · Aug 9, 2007

Willowmound said:
It certainly makes for a cleaner construction. But in English, de- is so much used, I reckon you can stick it on pretty much anything.

But that's just the bastardization of the language!!

Willowmound · Aug 9, 2007

Yup. But English is all about being a bastard.

Saxon, Flemish, Celtic, Norse, French, Latin, Punjabi, Native American (I know), Australian Aboriginal (I know), Maori (I know!), German, Italian... It contains influences from all, and from many, many more.

It's why I like it.

That (weird) word you love

aka cupcake

Mr. Invisible

It's probably a tumour

Mr. Invisible

Absolutely Fazed

Resist. Love. Go outside.

Absolutely Fazed

Veni Vidi Scripsi

:P

Happy to be here

Midnight Reading

Hoopy frood

Prodigal Muser

Lightly salted

Too sad for words.

Lightly salted

Lightly salted

Lightly salted