In music, one of these “leaning” grace observe clashes with the melody simply sufficient to create dissonance, then candy decision. It’s well-known for its capability to present you goosebumps: Think about Gustav Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, or the opening of Adele’s “Somebody Like You.”
The phrase is derived from “appoggiare,” an Italian verb that means “to lean,” which in flip comes from the Greek root “pod,” that means “toes,” together with “podium,” “pedestal” and “podiatrist” — suppliers of assist.
Lots of of Italian loanwords exist in English, particularly in fields like classical music or haute delicacies.
This time period was the Scripps Bee’s successful phrase in 2005, clinched by the 13-year-old Anurag Kashyap, who reported feeling “pure happiness” when he recited that victorious last “a” — rigidity, then launch.
Within the early Nineties, the British psychologist John Sloboda requested music aficionados to think about their favourite tear-jerking musical moments. Out of the 20 recognized phrases, 18 featured an appoggiatura.
This whimsical adjective that means “utopian” is derived from a nonsense noun that’s an anagram of “nowhere.”
The noun is the title of an 1872 novel by Samuel Butler. Satirizing Victorian society, the British creator concocted the phrase to explain a fantasyland that deifies bodily well being and treats sickness as a prison offense.
The phrase trickled from literary obscurity into the favored lexicon thanks largely to a Southern California grocery chain whose identify additionally comes from the Butler ebook. That retailer has developed an virtually cultlike following for its $22 almond butter and its smoothie collab with Hailey Bieber.
How does a distinct segment fictional reference turn out to be a “actual” phrase? Regularly, it’s when the time period “speaks to a pocket of expertise that individuals had been beforehand lacking from the language,” stated Yee-Lum Mak, a rhetoric scholar and the creator of “Different-Wordly.”
Not each nook of American tradition thirsts for an expression that means “wellness utopia,” however for a sure dialect of Los Angeles English, “erewhonian” satisfies a lexical hole.
This adjective denotes foxiness. It emerged within the early seventeenth century by manner of some Latin variations, all regarding foxes or their crafty qualities.
When the Swedish botanist (and homo sapien) Carl Linnaeus invented the binomial nomenclature system for classifying organisms in 1735, he used this phrase’s Latin root “vulpes” because the genus for “true foxes.”
Many early books about biology and drugs had been written in Latin. A lot of that terminology has been preserved (assume “larva” or “rhinoplasty”), which is why scientists typically sound like they’re talking a overseas language: They’re.
This phrase shares its cunning root with the identify of the Pokémon character Vulpix, a squash-hued fox with a bushy tail and fiery superpowers.
And should you’re a fan of The Instances’s personal Spelling Bee recreation, chances are you’ll bear in mind “vulpine” because the pangram from April 23, 2023.
In astronomy, it’s when three or extra celestial our bodies configure in an ideal line (the Earth, solar and moon throughout a photo voltaic eclipse, for instance). However in poetry, it describes a sort of consonant repetition — like alliteration, however not restricted to the beginnings of phrases — or a fusion of phrases for rhythmic impact.
The shortest English phrase to function three y’s, it’s most certainly a compound of the Greek prefix “syn-,” that means “along with,” and “zygon,” that means “yoke.”
Additionally descending from “zygon” are “zygote,” the product of two reproductive cells coming collectively, and “zygomatic bone,” a.okay.a. the cheekbone.
However amongst high spellers, “syzygy” is beloved for its particularity: It’s a type of singular English phrases that’s virtually not possible to spell should you don’t already comprehend it.
Outlined by Merriam-Webster as “careless handwriting: a crude or illegible scrawl,” this phrase is a semantic cousin of “graffiti.”
Coming into English through the French verb “griffonner,” that means “to scrawl,” its Center French ancestors included “grifouner” (to scribble), “griffon” (stylus) and the suffix “-age” (that means “the act of,” as in “tutelage” or “sabotage”).
“This phrase makes me consider a griffin making an attempt to carry a pen and having a tough time,” stated Ms. Mak, the rhetoric scholar, referring to the Greek mythological creature with an eagle’s head and wings and the physique of a lion. The 2 phrases will not be totally unrelated: “Griffe” is the French phrase for “claw,” and writing with talons does sound difficult.
Nonetheless, charming because the phrase itself could appear, griffonage might have lethal penalties.
A 2016 Johns Hopkins College research discovered that medical errors had been the third-leading reason for demise in america, and each physicians and ethics researchers have advised that medical doctors’ notoriously illegible handwriting might contribute.
“It is a enjoyable instance of a phrase that precisely describes itself,” stated Evan O’Dorney, the 2007 Scripps champion. It’s a chunk of zany made-up language whose definition is “zany made-up language” — a nonsense phrase which means “nonsense phrases.”
Lewis Carroll invented the time period for his 1871 novel “Via the Wanting-Glass”; it seems in a poem stuffed with polysyllabic whimsy a couple of fearsome, serpentine beast.
That is technically a nonce phrase: a lexical merchandise invented for one-time, special-occasion use (and which can or might not ultimately sit on the desk of on a regular basis English).
Carroll’s nonce legacy is illustrious. Along with this phrase, we even have him to thank for coining the noun “snark” and the verb “chortle.”
“Jabberwocky” loved a pop-culture renaissance within the mid-2000s due to Jabbawockeez, a San Diego hip-hop dance group that gained the primary season of “America’s Greatest Dance Crew” in 2008.
There’s one thing about this playful time period that appears to recommend its definition: a jumbled combination. Synonyms embody “ragbag” and “mishmash.”
Its earlier variations referred particularly to meals: a stew consisting of meat, greens and different miscellaneous components. One Medieval recipe known as for chopped goose, wine, water, onions and herbs.
In Center English, the phrase was spelled “hochepoche,” derived from the foundation “hotch” that means “to shake.”
“Hodgepodge” can be intently associated to a authorized time period, which dates again to the thirteenth century and incessantly comes up when dealing with wills, trusts and divorces.
In property regulation, that linguistic cousin, “hotchpot,” means “combination of property” and refers back to the course of of mixing and redistributing properties so all of the beneficiaries obtain their fair proportion — very like allotting a stew, however with much more paperwork.
A flamboyant model of artwork and ornament, born of the seventeenth century’s French Baroque motion (the Palace of Versailles is a first-rate instance), however incorporating extra asymmetry and a softer, pastel-leaning palette.
The phrase would possibly look Italian, however it really comes from the French “rocaille,” which suggests “rock” or “shell” and describes the lavish botanical ornament that was used (to extra, some would possibly argue) in elements of Europe within the 1700s.
For the reason that nineteenth century, English conversationalists have used the time period to imply “dated” or “out of trend,” its humorous phonetic bounce poking enjoyable on the bygone aesthetic’s gaudiness.
It seems within the title and refrain of a 2010 Arcade Fireplace tune, which begins, “Let’s go downtown and watch the trendy children,” and continues “Utilizing nice large phrases that they don’t perceive.”
A verb that means to provide an extended, oscillating cry that may sign a variety of highly effective feelings, from grief to ecstasy.
Very like an onomatopoeia, this can be a phrase whose sound displays its content material. “It’s a type of nice imitative phrases in English, like ‘tintinnabulation,’ a tinkling sound, and ‘borborygmus,’ an intestinal gurgle,” stated the lexicographer Kory Stamper.
The vocalization options in cultural celebrations internationally, together with Mizrahi Jewish henna ceremonies, Hindu temple rituals and weddings within the Center East and North Africa, the place it’s typically produced by ladies within the type of a high-pitched, joyous “Lililili!”
It additionally seems as a searching sign within the 1954 novel “Lord of the Flies” and as a spine-chilling battle cry within the 1962 movie “Lawrence of Arabia.”
And in 2022, when Morocco’s males’s soccer workforce made it to the World Cup semifinals, you can hear individuals rapturously ululate across the globe, from the streets of Casablanca to the stadium in Qatar.
From the Yiddish time period for “wood block,” this phrase was dropped at the U.S. by Jap European Jewish immigrants, and by the mid-Twentieth century it had turn out to be mainstream American slang, together with different pleasant loanwords together with “schmuck,” “schlep,” “mensch” and “oy vey.”
The Middle for Utilized Linguistics estimates that, earlier than the Holocaust, about 11 million individuals spoke Yiddish worldwide. Now, fewer than 1,000,000 individuals do, a tiny fraction of them as their native tongue.
Percussive and monosyllabic, this time period is phonetically as enjoyable to say as a curse phrase. And although it’s technically an insult for a slipshod individual (a sort of “blockhead”), it’s extra endearing than vulgar.
Youngsters of the Nineties might recall the publishing firm named after this phrase, which paired colourful crafts with how-to books on matters as assorted as cat’s cradle, magic and blues harmonica.
As bee phrases go, “klutz” is fairly mainstream. However typically, Okay-words are among the hardest to spell, in accordance with opponents. “In our expertise, the G’s, Okay’s and M’s have the best focus of zingers,” stated Evan O’Dorney, the one-time Scripps champ.