Issue #2
Authors Note
In the Words of Wisdom daily notes series, I grow my vocabulary with daily words and share what I learn along the way. I've always been somewhat of a curator, so years of annotations are finally being organized and put to use. On Wednesdays, I will give a word of wisdom roundup with the previous words of the week. Let's expand our vocabulary together, one word at a time.
Words to spice up your writing from the notes series Word of the Day. These 7 words are from the past week all curated here in the second edition of weekly word round up. Enjoy!
[30/05/2024]
Glossophobia
Noun [gloss•oh•foh•beeya]
A fear of public speaking
"She spoke eloquently but suffered from glossophobia and all she thought could only be read by her work, not her by her voice”
Etymology
“Glosso” comes from the Greek word "glossa", meaning "tongue", and “phobia ” comes from the word "fear or dread". This Greek-origin word describes perfectly what many people suffer from when public speaking, the tongue's fear of speaking.
[31/05/2024]
Lachesism
Noun[lock•iss•iz•em]
the desire to be struck by disaster
"As a child, she had a longing lachesism after viewing the attention a fellow classmate received during their accident ”
Etymology
A word procured by the author John Koenig from the The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows to describe an "undescribable emotion". Derived from the Greek Goddess Lachesis who determined how much time was allowed for each mortal, the word describes the desire and ultimate gamble with fate, life, and survival.
[01/06/2024]
Laconic
Adjective [le•con•ic]
Using minimum or few words
"When asked how he did on his exam, his laconic reply implied a bad result”
Etymology
The word Laconic can be taken all the back to the spartans of ancient Greece who were noted for their terse manners of speaking. With Greek origins, Lakōnikos, the native of Laconia, Sparta, then by way of Latin, this form of speech is not the only thing the Spartans had inspired.
[02/06/2024]
Doppelganger
Noun[do•pel•gan•ger]
Two or more people who have a striking resemblance to one another, almost identical-looking
"She saw her doppelganger in the airport for the first and last time ”
Etymology
Today we are taken to Germany with our first German-based word. The word "doppel" is German for the word "double," and "gänger", is German for the word "goer". Together, the word literally refers to your double, or doppelganger.
[03/06/2024]
Bibliophile
Noun[bib•le•oh•fiae•el]
A lover or collector of books
"he was considered a bibliophile due to his huge library of books”
Etymology
A French word with Greek origins, biblio comes from the Greek word biblion, meaning books, and philia from the Greek word philos meaning fondness or loving
[04/06/2024]
Telepathy
Noun[teh•leh•peh•thee]
Communication from two separate minds without speech or signs; extrasensory means
"the twins were known to use telepathy to communicate, but could never prove it when tested”
Etymology
The word Telepathy was coined in 1882 in a publication of the Society for Psychical Research and combines the Greek word tele- "far, and -pathy "distance" to describe the phenomenon of communicating without the means of the recognized sense organs
[05/06/2024]
Discombobulated
adjective [diss•cum•bob•you•lay•tid]
confused and disoriented
"After failing the test, she was left discombobulated"
Etymology
First American word of the series. First used in 1863, and based on the words discompose and discomfit, it was used to describe someone characterized by disorder and confusion. The suffix -ed was added at some later time.
Letters are primary colours used to construct a variety of words
Words are the rainbow used to paint a canvas of pictures
And pictures are worth a thousand words