week 14

If you know what a nettle is—that is, a barbed seed that gets stuck in your clothes and hair—then you'll have no trouble remembering the verb nettle: it means to annoy, bother, irritate, or bedevil.
A kid sister, a mosquito, an angry boyfriend, or a hot, muggy day: all of these are examples of things that might nettle a person. When you nettle someone, you act like a nettle; you annoy, bother, and generally tick off a person. The person who nettles you can be called nettlesome, which means that

One can be described as supine when lying face up ("his favorite yoga poses were always the supine ones"); or, if one is very passive or lethargic ("supine in the face of their threats and insults").
The adjective supine comes from a Latin word, supinus, which means “thrown backwards” or “inactive.” Whenever a person or animal is lying on its back, belly-up, it is supine. When your hand is open, palm-up, it is also supine. Supine can even describe a person who gives insufficient resistance, or w

The adjective incisive describes something that is sharp, decisive, and direct. A comment that cuts right to the bone can be just as incisive as an actual knife.
The word incisive is rooted in a Latin word that literally means "to cut with a sharp edge." To help you remember the meaning, you can think of the similar word, incisors, which are the teeth that are sharp and cut and tear. The more figurative meaning of describing something that is mentally sharp first appeared in the 1850s. Keen crit

If you have a cushy job — one that pays, but involves minimal work — then you have a sinecure. "Because he was the brother of the CEO, he was offered a sinecure in the company: he showed up each day and collected a pay check, but others actually did his work."
The noun sinecure comes from the Latin root words sine cura meaning "without care." It originally was used to describe a church position that did not include caring for the souls of parishioners, but that meaning is considered archaic now.

Does your life goal include world domination? Have an ambitious plan that involves gold medals and international fame? Then you definitely know what it means to aspire toward something big.
The verb aspire commonly means to aim or shoot for. But it comes from the Latin word aspirare, which means “to breathe upon.” So here's a trick for remembering this word: Think of yourself reaching up towards a spire, that really tall, tapered structure at the top of a church. Or, if you’re in a poetic mood,

Scurry means to move quickly, at a frenzied pace, and often also implies the urge to hide. When you come upon a mouse in your house, chances are it will scurry away.
Think of scurry this way — anytime you describe someone as scurrying, you're comparing them to a mouse. When you say troops scurried back behind their defensive lines, you're insulting them. When you say children scurry around searching for eggs during an Easter egg hunt, you think they're cute.

The adjective stentorian describes a booming voice. If you're teaching a group of unruly kids, you'll need to practice a stentorian voice to be heard above the din.
The adjective stentorian comes from Greek mythology. Stentor was a herald in the Trojan War, mentioned in Homer's "Iliad." Homer wrote of brazen-voiced Stentor, whose cry was as loud as that of fifty men together. So anyone with a stentorian voice has a voice like the mythic Stentor. You can also use stentorian to describe a style of

Picture an old man banging his fist on the dinner table, inveighing against the evils of teenagers' being allowed to listen to music and dance. Inveigh means to rail against something with hostility and passion.
Related to vehicle, inveigh comes from Latin in- + vehere "to carry." During the Vietnam War, war protesters held rallies where young men burned their draft cards and inveighed against the imperialist motives by which our country was being driven and the war's escalation without its ever

To repulse something is to repel it or drive it back. When you repulse your sister, you disgust her. When you repulse the enemy in battle or someone in conversation, you force them back or make them turn away.
Repulse is related to the word repel, and they mean similar things: to repulse an advance — romantic or warring — is to repel, or fend off, its advance. To repulse someone by being disgusting is to be repellent. You could repulse a person's attempts at conversation if you repulse him by pi

Lethal refers to anything dangerous enough to cause death. The cobra's venom is so lethal that if you get bitten and can't find the antidote, it's lights out forever.
Poisonous spiders, guns, knives, and radiation — all of these things can be lethal because they have the ability to kill. Even some substances that on their own aren't dangerous can become lethal in large quantities. Eating a peanut butter sandwich won't hurt most people, but it can be lethal to those with a nut allergy. Words like

Do you hear trumpets? With the word valor, you should. It was custom-ordered for a knight in resplendent armor sitting atop his noble steed. "Onward to deeds of valor!," you imagine him saying, anticipating his own unfailing courage.
Valor is often displayed in the face of something designed to crush it, and it is often rewarded with the conferring of a medal. "I, King Dreyfus, award you this silver cup in honor of your deeds of great courage. Your valor in the face of terrible danger must be re

Overt means open and done in plain sight. An overt attempt to get your teacher off-track might fail. Instead, try asking subtle questions about her kids, and she'll stay off topic all class.
If you speak French, remember that overt is the same as the French ouvert "open." If you don't speak French, give up all hope of ever learning this word. Just kidding –– forgive the overt attempt at humor. English speakers, here's your trick for remembering the difference between overt and covert: overt = "o

The adjective mammoth is a great way to describe something really, really big, like those huge woolly elephants they’re still finding in the melting glaciers.
The word mammoth is a pretty new one, dating back only to around 1700. It was first only a noun from the Russian word mammot, meaning “earth,” and used to name the newly-discovered fossilized creature that was thought to have burrowed in the earth like a mole. The word, a rare Russian contribution to English, was not used as an adjective u

Precipitate usually means "bringing something on" or "making it happen" — and not always in a good way. An unpopular verdict might "precipitate violence" or one false step at the Grand Canyon could precipitate you down into the gorge.
Precipitate, as a verb, can also mean specifically, "to fall from clouds," such as rain, snow, or other forms of precipitation. When used as an adjective, precipitate means "hasty" or "acting suddenly." If you decide to throw your class project in a trash masher ju

If something is extraordinary, remarkable, or one of a kind, you can say it is singular. A singular opportunity to sing onstage with a rock star is a remarkable opportunity.
Seeing the single inside singular can help you understand its meaning in the sense of one. In grammar, singular means one, as opposed to plural, which means more than one. But singular’s not always––or singularly––about being unique. Walking through a foggy cemetery might give you a singular feeling––or a feeling that’s odd

Relegate means assign to a lower position. If the quarterback of the football team stops making decent throws he might be relegated to the position of benchwarmer, while another kid is given the chance to play.
Relegate rhymes with delegate––both words derive from the Latin legare "send." Relegate means to send someone down in rank. Delegate means to send someone in your place to complete a task. In the workplace, managers who can't figure out how to delegate may get relegated to a lesser rank

Havoc is a noun that means devastation or total mayhem. Havoc often wreaked by hurricanes, angry mobs, plundering Vikings, and wild parties that get out of control.
If we trace havoc way back, we arrive at a crossroads. Some people believe that the word comes from the Old French havot, meaning “plundering, devastation,” while others argue that it was passed down to us from the Latin habere, meaning “to have, possess.” Either way you look at it, the meaning remains the same: widespread disorder o

A stereotype is a preconceived notion, especially about a group of people. Many stereotypes are racist, sexist, or homophobic.
Have you ever heard someone say Irish people are all drunks, or African-American people are always late, or women are bad drivers? Those are stereotypes: commonly held ideas about specific groups. You most often hear about negative stereotypes, but some are positive. For example, there's a stereotype that Asian people do better in school. One of many problems with any st

Use the noun bias to mean a preference for one thing over another, especially an unfair one.
Some biases are completely innocent: "I have a bias toward French wines." But most often, bias is used to describe unfair prejudices: "The authorities investigated a case involving bias against Latinos." It is also a verb meaning "to show prejudice for or against," as in "They claimed the tests were biased against women." (In British English, it takes an extra S in the forms biassed and biassing.) The wo