Hit Parade 2 Flashcards
Abate
(verb)
To lessen in intensity or degree
Accolade
(noun)
An expression of praise
Adulation
(noun)
Excessive praise; intense adoration
Aesthetic
(adj.)
Dealing with, appreciative of, or responsive to art or the beautiful
Ameliorate
(verb)
To make better or more tolerable
(E) She ameloriated the hotel’s cold room by placing in bed-warming sheets onto her friend’s bed.
Ascetic
(noun)
One who practices rigid self-denial, esp. as an arct of religious devotion
(e) ascetic monks
Avarice
(noun)
Greed, esp. for wealth (adj. form: avaricious)
(E) the avarice of the Marcoses
Axiom
(noun)
A universally recognizable principle (adj. form: axiomatic)
Burgeon
(verb)
To grow rapidly or flourish
(E) burgeoning crowd
Cacophony
(noun)
Harsh, jarring, discordant sound; dissonance (adj. form: cacophonous)
(E) Cacophonous sound of nails scratching a blackboard
Canon
(noun)
An established set of principles or code of laws, often religious in nature (adj. form: canonical)
(E) biblical canons = gospels
Castigation
(noun)
Sever criticism or punishment (ver form: castigate
(E) Every artist’s fear of castigation
Catalyst
(noun)
A substance that accelerates the rate of a chemical reaction without itself changing;
A person or thing that causes change
Caustic
(adj.)
Burning or stinging, causing corrosion;
Severely critical or sarcastic
(E) caustic remarks that are better left unsaid; cautic love
Chary
(adj.)
Wary; cautious; sparing
(E) chary in demonstrations of affection
Cogent
(adj.)
Appealing forcibly to the mind or reason; convincing
(E) the attorney’s cogent words
Complaisance
(noun)
Willingness to comply with the wishes of others (adj. form: complaisant)
(E) the rich man’s complaisant son unwillingly agrees to run the family business
Contentious
(adj.)
Argumentative; quarrelsome; causing controvery or disagreement
(E) contentious remarks all about, as if she wanted to start a fight
Contrite
(adj.)
Regretful; penitent; seeking forgiveness (noun form: contrition)
(E) that proud one’s lack of contrition
Culpable
(adj.) Deserving blame (noun: culpability)
(E) culpable thoughtlessness had kindled this burning envy onto the heart of his second son
Dearth
(noun)
Smallness of quantity or number; scarcity; a lack of
(E) in times of dearth and scarcity
Demur
(verb)
To question or oppose;
(noun)
Hesitation
(E) no room for demur or hesitation if you would not want to demur the unfolding of events
Didactic
(adj.)
Intend to teach or instruct
(E) a mentor’s didactic words and practice
Discretion
(noun)
Cautious reserve in speech; ability to make responsible decisions
(E) upon your discretion, whether to tell them or not
Disinterested
(adj.)
Free of bias or self-interest; impartial;
Not interested; indifferent
(E) Disinterested decisions, partially because he did not want to betray their friendship
Dogmatic
(adj.)
Expressing rigid opinion based on unproved or improvable principles
Strong set of principles concerning faith, morals, etc.
(E) tend to avoid arrogant dogmatic persons, no use in reasoning with them
Ebullience
(noun)
The quality of lively or enthusiastic expression of thoughts and feelings
(E) friendships filled with ebullient communication
Eclectic
(adj.)
Composed of elements drawn from various sources
(E) Post Modernism’s electic approach
Elegy
(noun)
A mournful poem, esp. one lamenting the dead (adj. form: elegiac)
(E) his playwrights tend to be melancholy, elegiac
Emollient
(adj.)
Soothing, esp. to the skin; making less hardh; mollifying, an agent that softens or smoothes the skin
(E) emollient lotion or salve
Empirical
(adj.)
Based on observation or experiement
(E) empirical data, empirical ethnographic record
Enigmatic
(adj.)
Mysterious; obscure; difficult to understand (noun: enigma)
(E) make shape of your enigmatic thoughts and forms
Ephemeral
(adj.)
Brief; fleeting
(E) the ephemeral appeal of flings
Esoteric
(adj.)
Intended for or understood by a small, specific group;
Private, secret, confidential
(E) esoteric allusions that only a few could understand
Eulogy
(noun)
Speech honoring the dead (verb form: eulogize)
(E) a eulogy for his dead father
Exonerate
(verb)
To remove blame
(E)
A day of release and exoneration for those accused
Facetious
(adj.)
Playful; humurous
Not meant to be taken seriously
(E)
He disguised his confession as a facetious anecdote
Fallacy
(noun)
An invalid or incorrect notion; a mistaken belief
(adj. form: fallacious)
Deceptive; misleading
(E)
A fallacious cheater
Furtive
(adj.)
Marked by stealth; covert; surrepticious
(E)
His steps too furtive, too covert and surrepticious to notice
Gregarious
(adj.)
Sociable; outgoing; enjoying the company other people
(E)
The gregarious extroverts
Harangue
(verb/noun)
To deliver forceful or angry speech; ranting speech or writing
(E)
From discussion to harangue, tension rose
Heretical
(adj.)
Violating accepted dogma or convention
(E)
They beheaded the heretics, those who questioned the church
Hyperbole
(noun)
An exaggerated statement, often used as a figure of speech
(E)
It was no hyperbole that cannibals existed in this land
Impecunious
(adj.)
Lacking funds; without money
(E)
The impecunious young couples
Incipient
(adj.)
Beginning to come into being or to become apparent
(E)
The incipient cold
Inert
(adj.)
Unmoving; lethargic; sluggish
(E)
He was reserved and inert, unappealing to thise used to ebullience
Innocuous
(adj.)
Harmless; causing no damage
Not interesting; pallid; not stimulating
(E)
A dry and innocuous personality
Intransigent
(adj.)
Refusing to compromise
(E)
The intransigent old, so set in their ways
Inveigle
(verb)
To obtain by deception or flattery
To lure, entice, ensnare by flattery
(E)
Avoid those who flatter too much to inveigle and entice you to do as they like
Morose
(adj.)
Sad; sullen; melancholy
(E)
Morose heavy words were all he could say
Odious
(adj.)
Evoking intense aversion or dislike
(E)
The judgmental and their odious remarks of everyone around them
Opaque
(adj.)
Impenetrable by light or not reflecting light
Penurious
(adj.)
Penny-pinching, excessively thrifty; ungenerous
(E)
The poor man’a penurious daughter and her frugal ways
Oscillation
(noun)
Act or state of swinging back and forth with a steady, uninterrupted rhythm
Pernicious
(adj.)
Extremely harmful in a way that is not easily seen or noticed
(E)
Overdosing in pills seemed to be a pernicious way to go
Peruse
(verb)
To examine with great care (noun form: perusal)
(E)
To peruse all strategies in preparation for the competition
Pious
(adj.)
Extremely reverent or devout; showing strong religious devotion
Precursor
(noun)
One that precedes and indicates or announces another
Preen
(verb)
To dress up; to primp; to groom oneself with elaborate care
(E)
Wish preening were a habit of mine
Prodigious
(adj.)
Abundant in size, force, or extent; extraordinary
(E)
His prodigious competitiveness
Prolific
(adj.)
Producing large volumes or amounts; productive
Putrefy
(verb)
To rot; to decag and give off a foul odor (adj. form: putrid)
(E)
His farts putrefied the entire room
Quaff
(verb)
To drink deeply
(E)
She wanted something warm to quaff and warm her insides
Quiescence
(noun)
Stillness; motionless; quality of being at rest
(E)
You cannot be quiescent when pursuing something
Redoubtable
(adj.)
Awe-inspiring; worthy of honor
(E)
Redoubtable feats, winning competition after competition
Sanction
(verb/noun)
Authorative permission or approval; a penalty intended to enforce compliance; to give permission or authority
(E)
They thought dressing up as soldiers would sanction their being there
Satire
(noun)
A literary work that ridicules or criticizes a human vice through humor or derision (adj. form: satirical)
Squalid
(adj.)
Sordid; wretched and dirty as from neglect
Stoic
(adj.)
Indifferent to or unaffected by pleasure or pain; steadfast
(E)
Best to be a stoic plant, unaffected by anything or anyone
Supplant
(verb)
To take place or supercede
(E)
Supplant his efforts and the original idea
Torpid
(adj.)
Lethargic, sluggish, dormant
(noun form: torpor)
(E)
He lost the love of his life due to his torpor
Ubiquitous
(adj. form)
Existing everywhere at the same time; constantly encountered; widespread
(E)
Starbucks, the ubiquitous brand
Urbane
(adj.)
Sophisticated, refined and elegant
(noun form: urbanity)
Vilify
(verb)
To defame; to characterize harshly
(E)
The unhappy wife tends to vilify her unknowing husband
Viscous
(adj.)
Thick; sticky
(noun form: viscosity)
