Unit14

Question 1

crypt

Answer 1

(1) A room completely or partly underground, especially under the main floor of a church.
(2) A room or area in a large aboveground tomb.

eg. His old nightmare was of being locked in a crypt with corpses as his only companions.

Question 2

encrypt

Answer 2

(1) To convert into cipher.
(2) To convert a message into code.

eg. Messages on the group’s Web site are encrypted in code words to keep law- enforcement agents from understanding them.

Question 3

cryptic

Answer 3

(1) Mysterious; puzzlingly short.
(2) Acting to hide or conceal.

eg. From across the room, Louisa threw Philip a cryptic look, and he puzzled over what she was trying to tell him.

Question 4

cryptography

Answer 4

(1) Secret writing.
(2) The encoding and decoding of messages.

eg. As a graduate student in mathematics, she never dreamed she would end up working in cryptography for the Defense Department.

Question 5

abscond

Answer 5

To depart in secret and hide.

eg. They discovered the next morning that their guest had absconded with most of the silverware during the night.

Question 6

abstemious

Answer 6

Restrained, especially in the consumption of food or alcohol.

eg. Her parents had left her two million dollars when they died, having been so abstemious for years that their neighbors all assumed they were poor.

Question 7

abstraction

Answer 7

The consideration of a thing or idea without associating it with a particular example.

eg. All the ideas she came up with in class were abstractions, since she had no experience of actual nursing at all.

Question 8

abstruse

Answer 8

Hard to understand; deep or complex.

eg. In every class he fills the blackboard with abstruse calculations, and we usually leave more confused than ever.

Question 9

pedagogy

Answer 9

The art, science, or profession of teaching.

eg. His own pedagogy is extremely original; it sometimes alarms school officials but his students love it.

Question 10

pedant

Answer 10

(1) A formal, unimaginative teacher.
(2) A person who shows off his or her learning.

eg. At one time or another, every student encounters a pedant who can make even the most interesting subject tedious.

Question 11

pediatrician

Answer 11

A doctor who specializes in the diseases, development, and care of children.

eg. Children in the U.S. usually see a pediatrician until they turn at least 15 or 16.

Question 12

encyclopedic

Answer 12

(1) Of or relating to an encyclopedia.
(2) Covering a wide range of subjects.

eg. Someone with the kind of encyclopedic knowledge she has should be competing on Jeopardy.

Question 13

tropism

Answer 13

Automatic movement by an organism unable to move about from place to place, especially a plant, that involves turning or growing toward or away from a stimulus.

eg. The new president was soon showing a tropism for bold action, a tendency that seemed more the result of instinct than of careful thought.

Question 14

entropy

Answer 14

(1) The decomposition of the matter and energy in the universe to an ultimate state of inactive uniformity.
(2) Chaos, randomness.

eg. The apartment had been reduced to an advanced state of entropy, as if a tiny tornado had torn through it, shattering its contents and mixing the pieces together in a crazy soup.

Question 15

heliotrope

Answer 15

Any of a genus of herbs or shrubs having small white or purple flowers.

eg. A long bank of purple heliotrope lined the walkway, and her guests were always remarking on the flowers’ glorious fragrance.

Question 16

psychotropic

Answer 16

Acting on the mind.

eg. My mother is taking two drugs that may produce psychotropic side effects, and I’m worried that they might be interacting.

Question 17

neoclassic

Answer 17

Relating to a revival or adaptation of the styles of ancient Greece and Roman, especially in music, art, or architecture.

eg. He had always admired the paintings of the French neoclassical masters, especially Poussin and Ingres.

Question 18

Neolithic

Answer 18

Of or relating to the latest period of the Stone Age, when polished stone tools were used.

eg. Around the Mediterranean, the Neolithic period was a time of trade, of stock breeding, and of the first use of pottery.

Question 19

neoconservative

Answer 19

A conservative who favors strongly encouraging democracy and the U.S. national interest in world affairs, including through military means.

eg. Many believed that foreign policy in those years had fallen into the hands of the neoconservatives, and that the war in Iraq was one result.

Question 20

neonatal

Answer 20

Of or relating to babies in the first month after their birth.

eg. The hospital’s newest addition is a neonatal intensive-care unit, and newborns in critical condition are already being sent there from considerable distances.

Question 21

novice

Answer 21

(1) One who has no previous training or experience in a specific field or activity; beginner.
(2) A new member of a religious order who is preparing to become a nun or monk.

eg. It’s hard to believe that a year ago she was a complete novice as a gardener, who couldn’t identify a cornstalk.

Question 22

novel

Answer 22

(1) New and not resembling something formerly known or used.
(2) Original and striking, especially in conception or style.

eg. His techniques for dealing with these disturbed young people were novel, and they caught the attention of the institute’s director.

Question 23

innovation

Answer 23

(1) A new idea, device, or method.
(2) The introduction of new ideas, devices, or methods.

eg. “Smooshing” bits of candy into ice cream while the customer watched was just one of his innovations that later got copied by chains of ice-cream outlets.

Question 24

supernova

Answer 24

(1) The explosion of a star that causes it to become extremely bright.
(2) Something that explodes into prominence or popularity.

eg. After exploding, a nova leaves a “white dwarf” which may explode again in the future, but a supernova destroys the entire star.

Question 25

impose

Answer 25

(1) To establish or apply as a charge or penalty or in a forceful or harmful way.
(2) To take unfair advantage.

eg. After seeing her latest grades, her parents imposed new rules about how much time she had to spend on homework every night.

Question 26

juxtapose

Answer 26

To place side by side.

eg. You won’t notice the difference between the original and the copy unless you juxtapose them.

Question 27

transpose

Answer 27

(1) To change the position or order of (two things).
(2) To move from one place or period to another.

eg. She rechecked the phone number and discovered that two digits had been transposed.

Question 28

superimpose

Answer 28

To put or place one thing over something else.

eg. Using transparent sheets, she superimposes territory boundaries on an outline of Africa, showing us how these changed in the late 19th and early 20th century.

Question 29

tenure

Answer 29

(1) The amount of time that a person holds a job, office, or title.
(2) The right to keep a job, especially the job of teacher or professor.

eg. I know two assistant professors who are so worried about being denied tenure this year that they can’t sleep.

Question 30

tenacious

Answer 30

Stubborn or determined in clinging to something.

eg. He was known as a tenacious reporter who would stay with a story for months, risking his health and sometimes even his life.

Question 31

tenable

Answer 31

Capable of being held or defended; reasonable.

eg. She was depressed for weeks after her professor said that her theory wasn’t tenable.

Question 32

tenet

Answer 32

A widely held principle or belief, especially one held in common by members of a group or profession.

eg. It was soon obvious that the new owners didn’t share the tenets that the company’s founders had held to all those years.

Question 33

monogamous

Answer 33

Being married to one person or having one mate at a time.

eg. Geese, swans, and most other birds are
monogamous and mate for life.

Question 34

monoculture

Answer 34

(1) The cultivation of a single crop to the exclusion of other uses of land.
(2) A culture dominated by a single element.

eg. Monoculture is practiced on a vast scale in the American Midwest, where nothing but corn can be seen in the fields for hundreds of square miles.

Question 35

monolithic

Answer 35

(1) Appearing to be a huge, featureless, often rigid whole.
(2) Made up of material with no joints or seams.

eg. The sheer monolithic rock face of Yosemite’s El Capitan looks impossible to climb, but its cracks and seams are enough for experienced rock climbers.

Question 36

monotheism

Answer 36

The worship of a single god.

eg. Christian monotheism finally triumphed in the Roman Empire in A.D. 392, when the worship of pagan gods and goddesses was forbidden.

Question 37

unicameral

Answer 37

Having only one lawmaking chamber.

eg. In China, with its unicameral system of government, a single group of legislators meets to make the laws.

Question 38

unilateral

Answer 38

(1) Done by one person or party; one-sided.
(2) Affecting one side of the body.

The Japanese Constitution of 1947 includes a unilateral rejection of warfare as an option for their country.

Question 39

unison

Answer 39

(1) Perfect agreement.
(2) Sameness of musical pitch.

eg. Unable to read music well enough to harmonize, the village choir sang only in unison.

Question 40

unitarian

Answer 40

Relating or belonging to a religious group that believes that God exists only in one person and stresses individual freedom of belief.

eg. With his unitarian tendencies, he wasn’t likely to get into fights over religious beliefs.