I spent last night looking all of these up in the dictionary just to make sure my bases were covered. You may laugh, but who’s the one walking around without shibboleths integrated into their working vocabulary?
via wordjournal, bmichael:
- sui generis
- solipsistic
- louche
- laconic
- saturnine
- antediluvian
- epistemological
- shibboleths
- penury
- sumptuary
- schadenfreude
- peripatetic
- abstruse
- parlous
- enervating
- adenoidal
- feckless
- solipsism
- ersatz
- fealty
- sanguine
- sartorial
- hagiography
- pandemic
- hagiographic
- dauphin
- antebellum
- paroxysm
- risible
- interlocutor
- swine
- apotheosis
- comity
- Atreus
- banal
- profligacy
- Sisyphean
- inchoate
- apoplectic
- neologisms
- bildungsroman
- peroration
- fungible
- recondite
- bonobo
- phlogiston
- contretemps
- appurtenances
- glut
- fecklessness
The West Wing taught me the meaning of shibboleth. And I know all of these - except for phlogiston, but I’ve corrected that terrible and gaping hole in my knowledge now - because I am a word nerd.
But I am shocked to find out that both “feckless” and “fecklessness” are on the list - there’s not a single person in Ireland who doesn’t know the meaning of those, I’d wager. Hiberno-English! It’s mad, Ted!
I love that “abstruse” is on this list. Most of these I only know because of AP English in high school. I’m sure of that because I would draw pictures or use mnemonic devices to learn them, and now every time I see solipsism, I see a brain floating in space, and every time I read “apoplectic” I can hear someone yelling “I AM SO APOPLECTIC RIGHT NOW I COULD PUNCH SOMEONE.”
Of course, none of these can be worked into my lexicon simply because I often accidentally say “fetus” instead of “inchoate,” and every time I say “apotheosis” I sing it in a high-pitched voice, trying for angelic.
