Comments on: Words I can never remember the meaning of

By: Leahr

Leahr — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 03:39:16 +0000

I had to come back and add:
anaphora!
That wikipedia page is getting way too familiar. I think I’ve looked it up a dozen times- it’s driving me crazy.

By: Leahr

Leahr — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 19:10:40 +0000

I have a lot of words like that. I like Lori S’s comment- mnemonics are the best solution for such words. I had to look up halcyon a dozen times…can’t remember any more right now.

By: Seth Christenfeld

Seth Christenfeld — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 05:25:18 +0000

For a very long time, I thought that “erstwhile” meant “long-time.” It wasn’t until later that I learned that it really means “former.”

By: Patrick

Patrick — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 13:28:55 +0000

I’m still baffled that someone thinks about those three words at all.

By: Danielle

Danielle — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 08:42:31 +0000

Longtime reader but first time chimer-inner to say YES! I perpetually forget what ’saturnine’ means and continue to confuse it with ‘handsome in that rugged sort of way you know you like.’ Heh.

(Ellis Peters uses that word all the time)

By: cuileann

cuileann — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 07:51:39 +0000

@ Janet (4):
What’s even worse about “enervated” is that the ennervate spell in Harry Potter REVIVES those who have been stunned. I don’t really need the extra confusion…;)

By: Mary Elizabeth S.

Mary Elizabeth S. — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 02:53:58 +0000

Huh. And here I thought a baleful expression was one of hopeless pleading. Why do people describe puppies has having large, baleful eyes? I’d better quit using it that way…

~Mary

By: atthecross

atthecross — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 19:18:31 +0000

baleful. i always think it means sad and hopeless… but it means murderous. needless to say i have gotten myself into many a pile of poo with this misunderstanding…

By: Justine

Justine — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 17:53:47 +0000

Kathleen & Celia: Saturnine can mean that if it’s modifier. As in “saturnine good looks”. But on it’s own it just means dark or gloomy. Though I have a feeling it gets used that way and may be shifting to meaning Byronic good looks.

By: Lori S.

Lori S. — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 14:43:04 +0000

My mnemonic for ‘pusillanimous’ is ‘pussy,’ aka ’scaredy cat.’ Crude, but it works.

By: Liz

Liz — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 14:30:56 +0000

Chiaroscuro is not an easy term for art historians either!!! I always think of Leonardo da Vinci’s drawing of hands. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Study_of_Arms_and_Hands.jpg
It’s really about playing with light and dark and creating volume to make everything look more alive and real with this technique. I am not sure anyone would ever use this term outside of art history though. Do they?

By: Celia

Celia — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 13:52:18 +0000

I find it’s easiest to remember if you match the first letters to the synonyms: first = former, last = latter. I seriously have to do this little mental check everytime I encounter the word, but it’s a lot harder to screw up than other methods I’ve heard.

I also agree with Kathleen that Byronically handsome totally is dark and gloomy.

And while I’m sure there’s a word or two I could use here, lately my biggest problem has been forgetting the second half of idioms while I’m saying them, and casting blindly around for the rest of it. “Well, that’s no skin off of my…duck’s back?”

By: AliceB

AliceB — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 13:29:04 +0000

Spendthrift. Shouldn’t it mean that you spend in a thrifty way?

By: cathy

cathy — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 13:21:53 +0000

Nonplussed.

Also, I’ve never been entirely sure what makes something ironic.

By: Nicholas Waller

Nicholas Waller — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 13:11:22 +0000

I always think of Pusillanimous as being aggressive and angry, as though it’s a union of Pugilistic and Animosity.

Chiaroscuro is not so much straight black & white, either flat blocks as in Sin City or variably grey as in b&w photos, but light and shade, as in well-rounded objects with strong highlights and dark areas; I always think of the painter Caravaggio when the word crops up.

My bete noires are hermeneutics and heuristic, though I don’t have much cause to come across them. It’s not that I think they mean something other than they do but I’ve looked them up several times and their meaning never sticks.

By: Reb

Reb — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 12:31:58 +0000

I have serious problems with “former” and “latter” because I can never remember which one actually means first, and when I try and reason it out I end up with neither one of them making sense to me anymore.

By: claire

claire — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 08:46:13 +0000

eschatological. tho’ honestly, when am i gonna use it anyway?

By: Jane

Jane — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 06:43:13 +0000

Hyperbole , hubris and paradigm – I know what they mean but I don’t feel it so I rarely use them myself and often have to look them up – to be sure, (to be sure)!

By: janet

janet — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 05:28:01 +0000

Ennervated. The word makes me think of “energetic,” but it means the opposite.

Livid. It means pale, but I always envision an intense red or green, maybe because it’s usually used to describe someone who’s angry.

It’s not so much that I can’t remember these words’ meanings, but that my intuitive sense of the meaning is different from the dictionary meaning.

Then there’s “decimated,” which technically refers to a situation in which 1 in 10 of something is destroyed, but is usually used to describe much more overwhelming destruction. That’s probably a secondary meaning of the word by now.

By: cuileann

cuileann — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 05:11:40 +0000

Paradigm. But that might be because I’ve never gotten a definition of satisfactory clarity. And formerly, dichotomy, but I think I’ve finally got that one down, after looking it up about ten times.

By: Kathleen

Kathleen — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 04:55:21 +0000

I thought “Byronically handsome” *meant* dark and gloomy.

By: Rachel Brown

Rachel Brown — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 04:43:13 +0000

Pullulating. In “Maximum City,” a porn movie is described as having “penises pullulating in vaginas.” I am still not sure what pullulating means.

Perhaps it’s related to pulsating. Though probably not pusillanimous.