Posted on 02/02/2007 6:21:08 AM PST by VRWCmember
In order that we might all raise the level of discourse and expand our language abilities, here is the daily post of "Word for the Day".
glasnost • \GLAHZ-nohst\ • noun
a Soviet policy permitting open discussion of political and social issues and freer dissemination of news and information
Example sentence:
Yuri welcomed glasnost because he could finally publish the article he had written about poverty in Moscow.
Did you know?
"Glasnost'" wasn't coined by former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev, but he was responsible for catapulting the word into the international media and the English vocabulary. The term derives from the Russian adjective "glasnyi," which means "public" and which itself traces to "glas," a root meaning "voice." In Russian, "glasnost" was originally used (as long ago as the 18th century) in the general sense of "publicity," and the Oxford English Dictionary reports that V.I. Lenin used it in the context of freedom of information in the Soviet state. However, it wasn't until Gorbachev declared it a public policy in the mid-1980s that "glasnost" became widely known and used in English.
Bonus Friday Words:
lothario \loh-THAIR-ee-oh\ noun
a man whose chief interest is seducing women
The Story Behind the Word
"Lothario" comes from The Fair Penitent (1703), a tragedy by Nicholas Rowe (1674-1718). In the play, Lothario is a notorious seducer, extremely attractive but beneath his charming exterior a haughty and unfeeling scoundrel. He seduces Calista, an unfaithful wife and later the fair penitent of the title. After the play was published, the character of Lothario became a stock figure in English literature. For example, Samuel Richardson (1689-1761) specifically modeled the character of Lovelace on Lothario in his 1748 novel Clarissa. As the character became well-known, his name became progressively more generic, and since the 18th century the word "lothario" has been used for a foppish, unscrupulous rake.
osculate \AHSS-kyuh-layt\ verb
kiss
The Story Behind the Word
"Osculate" comes from the Latin noun "osculum," meaning "kiss" or "little mouth." It was included in a dictionary of "hard" words in 1656, but we have no evidence that anyone actually used it until the 19th century (except for scientists who used it differently as a word for "contact"). Would any modern writer use "osculate"? Ben Macintyre did. In a May 2003 (London) Times piece entitled "Yes, It's True, I Kissed the Prime Minister's Wife," Macintyre wrote, "Assuming this must be someone I knew really quite well, I screeched 'How are you,' . . . and leant forward preparatory to giving her a chummy double-smacker . . . Perhaps being osculated by lunatics you have never seen before is one of the trials of being a Prime Minister's wife. She took it very well."
roué \roo-AY\ noun
a man devoted to a life of sensual pleasure; RAKE
The Story Behind the Word
The word roué can be traced back to the Latin noun rota, meaning 'wheel.' From the noun the verb rotare, 'to rotate,' was derived, which in Medieval Latin took on the sense 'to break on the wheel.' The wheel in question was the instrument of torture designed to extract a confession of guilt by stretching, disjointing, or otherwise mutilating the victim. Rotare became rouer in French, and roué is the past participle of that verb, meaning 'broken on the wheel.' About the year 1720 Philippe II, the Duke of Orleans and Regent of France, who was himself a profligate, called his wantonly licentious companions "roués," by which he meant that they deserved to be broken on the wheel. It has also been suggested that the duke may have called his friends roués because their debauches so exhausted them that they felt as though they had been broken on the wheel. In any case, roué then came to be applied to other such rakes and profligates, and its first appearance in English was around the year 1800.
Rules: Everyone must leave a post using the Word for the Day in a sentence.
The sentence must, in some way, relate to the news of the day.
The Review threads are linked for your edification. ;-)
Practice makes perfect.....post on....
Review Threads:
Review Thread One: Word For The Day, Thursday 11/14/02: Raffish (Be SURE to check out posts #92 and #111 on this thread!)
Review Thread Two: Word For The Day, Tuesday 1/14/03: Roister
Review Thread Three: Word For The Day, Tuesday 1/28/03: Obdurate
Review Thread Four: Word For the Day, Friday 7/25/03: Potation
Review Thread Five: Word For the Day, Monday 8/19/03: Stolid
Review Thread Six: Word for the Day, Tuesday 11/09/2004: Peripatetic (Post #125 may be my best anagram post ever)
great words today btw! i was in the mood for lewd ; )
That's so offensive...
Refresh my memory, but did I recommend that school to you?
I think it's pretty nice of you to cover Argh's day and open a room after a snowy commute.
go see your therapist, what, did you get up on the wrong side of the rock?
Sounds like somebody got up on the wrong side of the rock this morning.
You did, I remember.
if you did, i can't recall, but you might have. we pretty thoroughly researched the authentically Catholic universities and she visited them all.
Yunz watch too much tv.
if'n it ain't on foxnews i don't see it!
University of Dallas, huh? Never heard of it. It sounds like a good choice. Is she going to drive or will you be flying her around and shipping her stuff back and forth?
AveMaria in Naples, FL, Belmont Abbey in Charlotte, NC, UDallas, Christendom, in Front Royal VA and Franciscan U in Steubenville, OH, are pretty much it [there may be some in the West, like in CA] as far as authentically Catholic schools teaching to the Magisterium. etc.
At times Robbie really enjoys playing with Gable, and back in the house Gable LOVES to play tug of war with the rope toy.
Great pix.
your pups are SOOOO photogenic! and they looked like they had a great time in the snow. how fun for them!
well xshub is thinking when the time comes to move her in that he will drive her and xsboy down and xsbrownie and i will fly down to meet them. she will fly home for holidays and stuff but i think we have to do the big haul at least once. i did see on the website that they have ways for you to ship stuff to yourself there, realizing they have kids coming from all over.
She should have chosen Steubenville, then she could experience Pittsburgh (well, almost) for herself. I bet she didn't want to deal with winter.
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