Word of the Day
comeuppance
noun
deserved reward or just deserts, usually unpleasant.
More about comeuppance
Comeuppance “just deserts, usually unpleasant,” is an Americanism that first appeared in Harper’s Magazine in 1859. The word derives from the phrasal verb come up, as a case for judgment at a trial, and the common suffix –ance, which forms nouns from verbs, such as acceptance from accept, or appearance from appear.
how is comeuppance used?
He is such a convincing villain, in fact, that we are all very pleased that he meets his comeuppance when a falling telephone pole impales him while he’s searching for his cell phone.
The narrative is clear: humans get their comeuppance, Nature fights back, multiple cinematic disasters happen in the space of two hours.
verbicide
noun
the willful distortion or depreciation of the original meaning of a word.
More about verbicide
Verbicide, “the willful distortion of the original meaning of a word; a person who willfully distorts the meaning of a word,” comes from Latin verbum “word” and the English suffix –cide, a borrowing of the Latin suffixes –cīda “killer” and –cīdium “act of killing,” derivatives of the verb caedere “to cut down, strike, kill.” The willful distortion is usually something as harmless as a pun, or the weakening of the meanings of words like awful, awesome, divine, and ghastly (which occurs in all languages), as opposed to the perversion of language, especially political language, condemned by everyone from Thucydides in the 5th century b.c., to George Orwell in the mid-20th century. Verbicide entered English in the first half of the 19th century.
how is verbicide used?
“If the minister were not guilty of so much verbicide, if he were not so diffuse in everything he says, he would be able to give some information to Parliament.”
It illustrates not merely how the lazy use of phrases leads to foggy meanings, but how the deliberately lazy use of words can lead to a whole new sloppy concept, and, at worst, to deliberate verbicide.
perdure
verb (used without object)
to continue or last permanently; endure.
More about perdure
The verb perdure, “to continue or last permanently; endure to the end,” comes via Middle English perduren “to continue, persist” and Old French perdurer, pardurer “to last to the end,” from Latin perdūrāre “to persist, survive, carry on, hold out, endure to the end.” Perdūrāre is a compound of the prefix per-, here used as an intensive, and the simple verb dūrāre “to make or become hard, harden, steel oneself,” a derivative of the adjective dūrus “hard, firm; harsh, (taste) strong (taste); stubborn.” Perdure entered English in the 15th century.
how is perdure used?
He hadn’t yet observed anything resembling a grove of baobabs. They seemed to thrive in isolation, although perdure would be a better term for what they did.
Yet for all that, the Gospel has always required an institutional apparatus, without which it simply won’t be able to perdure throughout history.