LOL I love new words!

Next time your kids want to know where their allowance is, tell them you're tergiversating about whether they deserve this week's 20 bucks.

When the Dictionary.com "word-of-the-year" committee was batting about contenders for 2011's top spot, they were looking for some verbiage "that aptly defines the spirit of 2011."

Out of the online dictionary rose a word so apt, it covered events as wide-ranging as the Occupy movement, the Arab Spring and the stock market: tergiversate (pronounced "ter-JIV-er-sate").

According to the online word source, tergiversate means to change repeatedly one's attitude or opinions with respect to a cause, subject, etc.; equivocate.

Some could call it 'flip flopping,' but a kinder synonym might be updating one's opinion based on new facts.

"The stock market, politicians and even public opinion polls have tergiversated all year long," said a news release from Dictionary.com.

"One could say that events in Tahrir Square continue to tergiversate as sharply now as they did in the spring," it said.

Tergiversate is derived from the Latin word "vertere," to turn. It shares a root with the words "verse" and "versus."

Last year's word was change.

Factbox:

The 2011 runners-up include:

- zugzwang — a situation in chess in which a player is limited to moves that cost pieces or have a damaging positional effect.

- oppugnancy — opposing; antagonistic; contrary.

- internecine — of or pertaining to conflict or struggle within a group.

- quietus — a finishing stroke; anything that effectually ends or settles.

- occupy — to be a resident or tenant of; dwell in.

- winning — charming; engaging; pleasing.

- spring — to come or appear suddenly, as if at a bound.

- jobs — a post of employment; full-time or part-time position.

- austerity — severity of manner, life, etc.; sternness.

- bifurcating — to divide or fork into two branches.

- iconoclasm — the action or spirit of a destroyer of images, especially those set up for religious veneration.

- schismatic — of, pertaining to, or of the nature of division or disunion, especially into mutually opposed parties; guilty of division or disunion.

- topple — to overthrow, as from a position of authority.

- uprising — an insurrection or revolt.

Source: Dictionary.com

I dislike any words that end in -ating or -erate. Sports talk radio has ruined the English language with non- words like conversate, orientate, transportate, commentate, resignate, defensed. You really mean converse, orient, transport, comment, resign, and defended- perfectly good verbs that have been in the language for centuries. I will not accept tergiversate. How do I know it is not really tergiverse? I also have problems with oppugnancy and quietus. The rest appear to be real words. I am an English language curmudgeon, of sorts. I have many grammar pet peeves as well and I cannot regain respect for a teacher or editor who makes an erroneous correction. I got someone fired for making erroneous corections of my reports, when I did not mean to- I only wanted him to stop editing my stuff. Sorry.

cur·mudg·eon/kərˈməjən/




Noun:




A bad-tempered or surly person.







Synonyms:


niggard - miser - skinflint - tightwad

as is bifurcate.  But they also use a lot of made up words

The 4 "R's": reduce - reuse - recycle - regurgitate

got someone fired for making erroneous corections corrections of my reports, when I did not mean to-

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

FYI:

See, that was not an erroneous correction, but a deserved one.  That was a typographical error, and I would certainly expect that to be edited.  Also, chatting on a message board does not require the same level of editing as a forensic court report.

Thanks for those origins though.  I can love those words a little more now that they have latin origins.  That doesn't always make them appropriate for use in the vernacular though.  Strunk and White is my usage bible.  Those sports radio words I mentioned would also have latin origins, but are incorrect usage.

I hate that I carry this burden- I wish I could be normal and not waste my stress over these things.  How did I get like this?????  As some of you know, even in chat I go back and make corrections all night long no matter how many times you tell me you understand chatese.  I need a 12 step group.
  

LOL, I hear ya. I am forever thrown into a tizzy when someone uses "then" and "than" interchangeably. For some reason that just irks me, lol. That and "your" for "you're" or vice versa.  I'm very bad typos and spelling these days. Age related "sometimers" has me searching for correct spelling all the time. My grammar is eroded and I'll be damned if I can remember when and where to use a comma. Hubby says that I have "comma-itis" and just throw them in anywhere. He's right! ha ha

I should have included the origins of the words in my original post.  



  

How can one relax when people are splitting infinitives and ending sentences with prepositions as we speak?
  

Lol!  I (believe it or not) made A's in English honors in college but the prof was always complaining about my split infinitives...he loved my writing but hated my grammar (?)....and he forever was asking me if I knew how to use periods and commas! He accused me of trying to imitate Faulkner's style!

Oh the humanity!!!

Even worse - split ends.

I think it's supposed to be:  "Oh, the inhumanity"
  

I was using the words of  Herb Morrison during the Hindenburg disaster.

"It's practically standing still now. They've dropped ropes out of the nose of the ship, and they've been taken a hold of down on the field by a number of men. It's starting to rain again; it's—the rain had slacked up a little bit. The back motors of the ship are just holding it just, just enough to keep it from — It burst into flames! It burst into flames, and it's falling, it's crashing! Watch it! Watch it, folks! Get out of the way! Get out of the way! Get this, Charlie! Get this, Charlie! It's fire—and it's crashing! It's crashing terrible! Oh, my, get out of the way, please! It's burning and bursting into flames, and the—and it's falling on the mooring-mast and all the folks agree that this is terrible, this is the worst of the worst catastrophes in the world. [Indeciperable word(s)] It's–it's–it's the flames, [indecipherable, possibly the word "climbing"] oh, four- or five-hundred feet into the sky and it ... it's a terrific crash, ladies and gentlemen. It's smoke, and it's flames now ... and the frame is crashing to the ground, not quite to the mooring-mast. Oh, the humanity and all the passengers screaming around here. I told you, I can't even talk to people whose friends are on there. Ah! It's–it's–it's–it's ... o–ohhh! I–I can't talk, ladies and gentlemen. Honest, it's just laying there, a mass of smoking wreckage. Ah! And everybody can hardly breathe and talk, and the screaming. Lady, I–I'm sorry. Honest: I–I can hardly breathe. I–I'm going to step inside where I cannot see it. Charlie, that's terrible. Ah, ah—I can't. I, listen, folks, I–I'm gonna have to stop for a minute because I've lost my voice. This is the worst thing I've ever witnessed."

http://en.wikipedia.org/w...Morrison_%28announcer%29