Word of the Day
Learn a new word every day! The Dictionary.com team of language experts carefully selects each Word of the Day to add some panache to your vocabulary.
an irrational or disproportionate fear of poetry: Being forced to read John Donne's sonnets aloud in front of my English class gave me such bad metrophobia that I can't even look at greeting card poetry without getting sweaty palms and a dry mouth.
You may think that metrophobia means “fear of big cities" based on the word metropolis. In fact, metrophobia means “fear of poetry," a compound of Greek métron (inflectional stem metr-) “measure, length, size, meter (of music or poetry)” and -phobia. Metrophobia entered English in the late 20th century.
exaggerated sentimentalism, as in music or soap operas.
Schmaltz comes from Yiddish shmalts and German Schmaltz, with two meanings: “liquid animal fat, especially chicken fat,” and by extension “exaggerated sentimentalism.” (The adjective schmaltzy, however, means only “exaggeratedly sentimental.”) Before Americans became concerned about their diets, one could go to a Jewish restaurant and find on the table a bottle or cruet filled with schmaltz to make sure diners maintained a proper level of cholesterol in their blood. Schmaltz in its dietary sense entered English at the end of the 18th century; in its critical sense, in the mid-1930s.
to use or address with harsh or abusive language; revile.
Vituperate, “to address with harsh language, revile,” comes straight from Latin vituperātus, the past participle of the verb vituperāre “to spoil, blame, criticize adversely, find fault with.” The formation of vituperāre is a little irregular: The first element of this compound appears to be noun vitium “fault, defect, shortcoming” (and via Old French, the source of English vice). Viti- is the combining form of vitium before labial consonants (p, b, m). But the element -perāre is problematic, sometimes explained as a combining form of parāre “to prepare,” sometimes as a verb derivative of the adjective pār “matching, equal” (as in the verb aequiperāre, aequiparāre “to equalize, compare”). Vituperate entered English in the first half of the 16th century.
one’s reason for being, which in principle is the convergence of one’s personal passions, beliefs, values, and vocation: those who follow the concept of ikigai undertake the activities of their life with willingness and a satisfying sense of meaning.
Ikigai, a Japanese word meaning “one’s personal reason for living,” is not easy to define in two minutes. Ikigai is a compound of iki “life, living, being alive” (from the verb ikiru “to live”) and the combining form -gai, from kai “worth, value, benefit.” In Japan in the 1960s, ikigai was for the betterment of society; in the 21st century, however, ikigai seems to focus on the development of oneself for the future, or self-actualization. Ikigai entered English in the early 1970s.
begone: Aroint thee, varlet!
The obsolete imperative verb or exclamation aroint! or aroint thee! means “begone!” Aroint has no convincing or even plausible etymology. The phrase Aroint thee, witch! first appears in Shakespeare’s King Lear and Macbeth. Aroint thee, witch! next appears in the works of the Scottish author and antiquarian Sir Walter Scott in 1816.
