Unit4

Question 1

carnivorous

Answer 1

Meat-eating or flesh-eating.

eg. He’d gotten tired of his vegetarian guinea pigs and decided he preferred carnivorous pets such as ferrets.

Question 2

herbivorous

Answer 2

Plant-eating.

eg. In spite of their frightening appearance, marine iguanas are peaceable herbivorous animals that feed mostly on seaweed.

Question 3

insectivorous

Answer 3

Feeding on insects.

eg. Their rather odd 12-year-old son kept insectivorous plants in his bedroom and fed them live flies.

Question 4

voracious

Answer 4

Having a huge appetite.

eg. One of the hardest parts of dieting is watching skinny people with voracious appetites consume large amounts of food without gaining weight.

Question 5

carnage

Answer 5

Great destruction of life (as in a battle); slaughter.

eg. Countries around the world appealed to all sides of the conflict to stop the carnage of the war in Bosnia.

Question 6

carnal

Answer 6

Having to do with bodily pleasures.

eg. The news stories about students on Spring Break tend to focus on the carnal pleasures associated with the annual ritual.

Question 7

incarnate

Answer 7

Given bodily or actual form; especially, having human body.

eg. For the rest of his life, he would regard his childhood nanny as goodness incarnate.

Question 8

reincarnation

Answer 8

(1) Rebirth in new bodies or forms of life. (2) Someone who has been born again with a new body after death.

eg. Even as a child he struck everyone as a reincarnation of his grandfather, not in his features but in his manner and personality.

Question 9

credence

Answer 9

Mental acceptance of something as true or real; belief.

eg. He scoffed and said no one still gives any credence to the story of the Loch
Ness monster.

Question 10

credible

Answer 10

(1) Able to be believed; reasonable to trust or believe. (2) Good enough to be effective.

eg. Because of her past criminal record, the defense lawyers knew she wouldn’t be a credible witness.

Question 11

credulity

Answer 11

Readiness and willingness to believe on the basis of little evidence.
eg. Thrillers and action movies only succeed if they don’t strain our credulity too much.

Question 12

credo

Answer 12

(1) A statement of the basic beliefs of a religious faith. (2) A set of guiding principles or beliefs.

eg. She claims she made her money on Wall Street just by following the old credo “Buy low, sell high.”

Question 13

affidavit

Answer 13

A sworn statement made in writing.

eg. The whole family had signed affidavits stating that they believed the will to
be valid.

Question 14

diffident

Answer 14

Lacking confidence; timid, cautious.

eg. He always found it a struggle to get his most diffident students to speak in front of the class.

Question 15

fiduciary

Answer 15

(1) Having to do with a confidence or trust. (2) Held in trust for another.

eg. Pension-fund managers have a fiduciary responsibility to invest the pension’s funds for the sole benefit of those who will receive the pensions.

Question 16

perfidy

Answer 16

Faithlessness, disloyalty, or treachery.

eg. While working for the CIA he was lured into becoming a double agent, and it seems he paid a high price for his perfidy.

Question 17

concurrent

Answer 17

Happening or operating at the same time.

eg. The killer was sentenced to serve three concurrent life terms in prison.

Question 18

cursory

Answer 18

Hastily and often carelessly done.

eg. Having spent the weekend going to parties, she had only given the chapter a cursory reading before class on Monday.

Question 19

discursive

Answer 19

Passing from one topic to another.

eg. Some days he allowed himself to write long discursive essays in his diary instead of his usual simple reporting of the day’s events.

Question 20

precursor

Answer 20

One that goes before and indicates the coming of another.

eg. Scientists are trying to identify special geological activity that may be a precursor to an earthquake, which will help them predict the quake’s size, time, and location.

Question 21

quadruped

Answer 21

An animal having four feet.

eg. She always tells her friends that their farm has five kinds of quadrupeds: sheep, goats, cows, horses, and pigs.

Question 22

pedigree

Answer 22

The line of ancestors of a person or animal.

eg. She talks a lot about her pedigree, but never mentions that a couple of her uncles spent time in prison.

Question 23

impediment

Answer 23

Something that interferes with movement or progress.

eg. Her poorly developed verbal ability was the most serious impediment to her advancement.

Question 24

pedestrian

Answer 24

Commonplace, ordinary, or unimaginative.

eg. While politicians endlessly discussed the great issues facing Russia, the Russians worried about such pedestrian concerns as finding enough food, shelter, and clothing.

Question 25

deflect

Answer 25

To turn aside, especially from a straight or fixed course.

eg. The stealth technology used on bombers and fighter jets works by deflecting radar energy, making them “invisible.”

Question 26

reflective

Answer 26

(1) Capable of reflecting light, images, or sound waves. (2) Thoughtful.

eg. He likes action movies and going out drinking with friends, but when you get to know him you realize he’s basically reflective and serious.

Question 27

genuflect

Answer 27

To kneel on one knee and then rise as an act of respect.

eg. At religious shrines in China, pilgrims may not only genuflect but actually lie down flat on the ground.

Question 28

inflection

Answer 28

(1) A change in the pitch, tone, or loudness of the voice. (2) The change in form of a word showing its case, gender, number, person, tense, mood, voice, or comparison.

eg. She couldn’t understand her grandfather’s words, but she knew from his inflection that he was asking a question.

Question 29

posterior

Answer 29

Situated toward or on the back; rear.

eg. In a human posterior and dorsal can both refer to the back, but in a fish posterior refers to the tail area.

Question 30

posthumous

Answer 30

(1) Published after the death of the author. (2) Following or happening after one’s death.

eg. Though Van Gogh scarcely sold a single painting during his lifetime, he rose to posthumous fame as one of the world’s great artists.

Question 31

postmodern

Answer 31

Having to do with a movement in architecture, art, or literature that is a reaction against modernism and that reintroduces traditional elements and techniques in odd contexts as well as elements from popular culture.

eg. The postmodern AT&T building in New York, with the “Chippendale” top that reminds viewers of an antique dresser, aroused a storm of criticism.

Question 32

postmortem

Answer 32

(1) Occurring after death. (2) Following the event.

In their postmortem discussion of the election, the reporters tried to explain how the polls and predictions could have been so completely wrong.

Question 33

calypso

Answer 33

A folk song or style of singing of West Indian origin that has a lively rhythm and words that are often made up by the singer.

eg. If you take a Caribbean vacation in December, you end up listening to a lot of Christmas carols played to a calypso beat.

Question 34

odyssey

Answer 34

(1) A long, wandering journey full of trials and adventures. (2) A spiritual journey or quest.

eg. Their six-month camping trip around the country was an odyssey they would always remember.

Question 35

palladium

Answer 35

A precious, silver-white metal related to platinum that is used in electrical contacts and as an alloy with gold to form white gold.

eg. Most wedding rings today are simple bands of gold, platinum, or palladium.

Question 36

Penelope

Answer 36

A modest domestic wife.

eg. Critics of Hillary Rodham Clinton in the 1990s would perhaps have preferred her to be a Penelope, quietly tending the White House and staying out of politics.

Question 37

procrustean

Answer 37

Ruthlessly disregarding individual differences or special circumstances.

eg. The school’s procrustean approach seemed to assume that all children learned in the same way and at the same rate.

Question 38

protean

Answer 38

(1) Displaying great versatility or variety. (2) Able to take on many different forms or natures.

eg. A protean athlete, he left college with offers from the professional leagues to play baseball, football, and basketball.

Question 39

sibyl

Answer 39

A female prophet or fortune-teller.

eg. The villagers told him about an aged woman who lived alone in a hut on a nearby mountain, a sibyl who knew the future and would prophesy under the right conditions.

Question 40

siren

Answer 40

A woman who tempts men with bewitching sweetness.

eg. Reporters treated her like a sex symbol, but she lacked the graceful presence and air of mystery of a real siren.