Favorite most unused words

13

Replies

  • pudadough
    pudadough Posts: 1,271 Member
    edited March 2015
    Malfeasant: wrongdoing, especially by a public official.

    When my dog is acting suspect I'll ask her if she's been engaging in malfeasance. I love it because it sounds so absurd. She's gonna be the only dog to pass the SAT someday.

  • RJ0274
    RJ0274 Posts: 4,173 Member
    criminy - A minced oath that expresses surprise.
  • tat2cookie
    tat2cookie Posts: 1,899 Member
    Facetious
  • CJisinShape
    CJisinShape Posts: 1,404 Member
    Nonsense: when a scientist tries to tell you what happened billions of years ago when they can't say for certain what currently exists.

    Example:
    "Scientists describe Ceres as an "embryonic planet." Gravitational perturbations from Jupiter billions of years ago prevented it from becoming a full-fledged planet."

    They are going to orbit this thing in a few days and might figure out what some lights shining from it's surface is. They don't know what the lights ARE, but they have the hubris to tell us how the entire thing came into being.

    ...and some will lambast me for being a rube "because science."

    http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Dwa_Ceres
  • jdc026
    jdc026 Posts: 4
    Defenestrate - v. to throw someone out of a window
    ineptitude
    frivolity
    shanty
    scantily clad (2 words but still, both awesome words)
  • 4leighbee
    4leighbee Posts: 1,275 Member
    politicizing.
    Despite grand and noble efforts to the contrary, we still could not avoid politicizing this previously academic conversation thread. :/
  • Tomm88
    Tomm88 Posts: 733 Member
    i missed my deadline by a baw hair... ( ball hair)
  • CJisinShape
    CJisinShape Posts: 1,404 Member
    4leighbee wrote: »
    politicizing.
    Despite grand and noble efforts to the contrary, we still could not avoid politicizing this previously academic conversation thread. :/

    Academia: an institution where large and copious amount of words are used to confuse those outside their field of study into believing they actually know what they say they know.

    Which is precisely the subject of this thread.

  • CJisinShape
    CJisinShape Posts: 1,404 Member
    Sokal Affair: an experiment played by a physicist to prove that incoherant gibberish completely void of logic would be generally accepted by academia if it contained enough impressive jargon and quotes leaning toward leftist ideology.

  • 4leighbee
    4leighbee Posts: 1,275 Member
    CJisinShape wrote: »
    Sokal Affair: an experiment played by a physicist to prove that incoherant gibberish completely void of logic would be generally accepted by academia if it contained enough impressive jargon and quotes leaning toward leftist ideology.

    lol!
  • infinitevast
    infinitevast Posts: 875 Member
    Bitchin
  • wildrose53
    wildrose53 Posts: 1,342 Member
    Perendinate : To put something off until the day after tomorrow; to remain at college for unusually long time.
  • Lisa1971
    Lisa1971 Posts: 3,069 Member
    Slobberknocker

    Being a HUGE football fan I love to see a slobberknocker of a hit! Especially when it's on anyone who plays for Michigan, the eagles, or Pissburgh.
  • DolceDeeFit
    DolceDeeFit Posts: 15
    Flabbergasted: surprise (someone) greatly; astonish
  • ChicagOH
    ChicagOH Posts: 75 Member
    Fanatic. One who obsessively follows a person or premise, regardless of any actual merit and to the exclusion of logic. See: Religious Zealot
  • davesgalforever
    davesgalforever Posts: 220 Member
    Lollygag....sounds dirty...lol.
  • My_Mind_Is_My_Cage
    My_Mind_Is_My_Cage Posts: 1,344 Member
    WAY too many starting with tatterdemalion, plethora, vicissitude, and veracity
  • BlueEyedRedhead
    BlueEyedRedhead Posts: 5,169 Member
    CyberTone wrote: »
    Onomatopoeia - The formation or use of words, such as buzz or cuckoo, that imitate what they denote.

    This has been a favorite of mine since high school :)

  • BlueEyedRedhead
    BlueEyedRedhead Posts: 5,169 Member
    charlesbuckler wrote: »
    funkybuttlovin

    Use it often!

  • AmbitiousButRubbish
    AmbitiousButRubbish Posts: 246 Member
    exacerbate. Sounds dirty but isn't ;)
  • WarDamnJay
    WarDamnJay Posts: 1,916 Member
    Debauchery
  • BrandNewMan1970
    BrandNewMan1970 Posts: 373 Member
    Unrequited- to feel love not returned
  • BrandNewMan1970
    BrandNewMan1970 Posts: 373 Member
    CyberTone wrote: »
    baysidebitches wrote: »
    Curmudgeon a person who is easily annoyed and complains
    Curmudgeon - Could you use that in a sentence please?
    - MFP should implement a curmudgeon flag.

    No one wants to argue with a curmudgeon
  • DWBalboa
    DWBalboa Posts: 37,259 Member
    supercalifragilisticexpialidocious and Llama, it's just fun to say. Go ahead and say it, “llama” See! Wasn’t that fun? Now you don’t want to stop do ya, I know I don’t!
    Llama, llama, llama!
  • 4leighbee
    4leighbee Posts: 1,275 Member
    There is a fascinating (depending on your level of English language geekdome) discussion of the proper usage of the word "myriad" here ... http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/20133/what-is-the-correct-usage-of-myriad.

    I learned something. (And now, after reading through some of that, I will be even more tentative when using it.)
  • SyzygyX
    SyzygyX Posts: 189 Member
    Sycophant, mellifluous, sesquipedalian.
  • dasher602014
    dasher602014 Posts: 1,992 Member
    Regardless - good word which seems to have been replaced. I just miss it.
  • Eserra0510
    Eserra0510 Posts: 42 Member
    I love (and use) the word persnickety! Another that comes to mind is picayune! = 1. Of little value or importance; paltry. See Synonyms at trivial.
    2. Petty; small-minded: "It had seemed picayune to get all bent out of shape organizing the household chores" It was also an old Spanish coin, worth very little.
  • sheldonz42
    sheldonz42 Posts: 233 Member
    discombobulate - upset or confuse
  • ldrosophila
    ldrosophila Posts: 7,512 Member
    Not necessarily underused, but I really wish we could use gay interchangeably with joyful.
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