Word of the Day

Desegregation, “the elimination of laws under which people are separated,” is a compound of de-, “not, un-,” and segregation, which comes from Latin sēgregāre, “to part from the flock.” Sēgregāre is formed from sē-, “without, apart,” and grex (stem greg-), “flock,” the latter of which is also the source of congregate (literally meaning “to flock together”), gregarious (“belonging to a flock”), and egregious (“out of the flock”). Though segregation is often contrasted with its rhyming opposite integration, the two are unrelated. Instead, integration ultimately comes from Latin integer, “untouched, undivided, whole.” Desegregation was first recorded in English in the early 1950s. (Read more about an important example of desegregation on this day in 1960.) EXAMPLE OF DESEGREGATION USED IN A SENTENCE A flurry of court cases and legislation, such as Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, was critical to desegregation in the United States.

Gouache, “an opaque watercolor prepared with gum,” is a loanword from French and is adapted from Italian guazzo, originally meaning “place where there is water.” Guazzo, in turn, apparently comes from Latin aquātiō, of the same meaning, from aqua, “water.” The Italian descendant of Latin aqua is acqua, and the Latin suffix -tiō usually becomes -gione, -zione, or -zzone in Italian, which is why Latin aquātiō is also the source of Italian acquazzone, “downpour.” How guazzo came into being, when it does not follow standard Latin-to-Italian sound change patterns, is a bit of a mystery, but one possibility is that guazzo reflects an early borrowing from a Romance language of northern Italy. Gouache was first recorded in English in the early 1880s. EXAMPLE OF GOUACHE USED IN A SENTENCE In contrast to watercolors, which are designed to be translucent, the thickness of gouache allows for bold colors after a single session of painting.

Perennial, “perpetual, continuing,” comes from Latin perennis, “lasting the whole year through,” which is based on per, “through, by,” and -enn-, a combining form of annus, “year.” A common trend in Latin is for a to change to e or i in compounds; other examples of this include ars, “skill,” becoming iners, “unskillful” (compare art and inert), and amīcus, “friend,” becoming inimicus, “unfriendly” (compare amicable, enemy, and the Word of the Day inimical). Perennial is often confused with annual because the two have similar meanings and origins, but you can learn to tell the difference by reading our article on these words. Perennial was first recorded in English circa 1640. EXAMPLE OF PERENNIAL USED IN A SENTENCE A key feature of the lands north of the Arctic Circle is its nearly perennial winter, with cold temperatures even in July.

The Oort cloud is the namesake of Dutch astronomer Jan Hendrik Oort, who first proposed the cloud’s existence. The surname Oort comes from Middle Dutch ort or oort, meaning “edge, corner, outermost point,” which makes the name Oort cloud serendipitously perfect for an area at the farthest reaches of the Solar System. Oort cloud was coined in the 1970s. EXAMPLE OF OORT CLOUD USED IN A SENTENCE Because the Oort cloud is so far away and contains such dim objects, we may never know just how many comets are secretly lurking out there. FUN FACT ABOUT OORT CLOUD While the Kuiper belt is 30–50 astronomical units (AU) from the Sun and contains dwarf planets, the Oort cloud is a whopping 2,000–200,000 AU from the Sun and contains only asteroid-like objects. Learn more fun facts at the Museum of Science.

Pantoum, “a Malay verse featuring repeated lines,” is a borrowing from French of Malay origin. Malay has two widely used standardized forms: Standard Malay, which is an official language in Malaysia and Singapore, and Indonesian, spoken by about 300 million people in Indonesia. Because Malay is a member of the Austronesian language family, it is distantly related to Hawaiian, Malagasy (in Madagascar), Maori (in New Zealand), and Tagalog (in the Philippines). The Malay source of pantoum is pantun, with the change from n to m because of a printer’s error in 19th-century France. Pantoum was first recorded in English in the early 1880s. EXAMPLE OF PANTOUM USED IN A SENTENCE The regular repetition of lines in pantoums means that poets have to be clever about context and meaning, or readers may find the verses rather stale.