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Click flashcard terms on the left to see their definitions.

All terms in this list:

abjure: To renounce upon oath; to forswear; to disavow.

abrogate: Repeal or do away with (a law, right, or formal agreement)

abstemious: Not self-indulgent, esp. when eating and drinking

acumen: quickness of perception or discernment; penetration of mind; the faculty of nice discrimination

antebellum: Of the time period prior to a war.

auspicious: Of good omen; indicating future success.

belie: To give a false representation of something.

bellicose: Warlike in nature; aggressive; hostile.

bowdlerize: To remove those parts of a text considered offensive, vulgar, or otherwise unseemly.

chicanery: Deception by use of trickery, quibbling, or subterfuge.

chromosome: A structure in the cell nucleus that contains DNA, histone protein, and other structural proteins.

churlish: Of or pertaining to a serf, peasant, or rustic.

circumlocution: A roundabout or indirect way of speaking; the use of more words than necessary to express an idea.

circumnavigate: To travel completely around somewhere or something, especially by sail.

deciduous: Describing a part that falls of, or is shed, at a particular time or stage of development.

deleterious: harmful or hurtful, to physical, mental or moral health.

diffident: Modest or shy because of a lack of self-confidence

enervate: Lacking in energy or vitality

enfranchise: Give the right to vote to

epiphany: A manifestation or appearance of a divine or superhuman being.

equinox: The intersection of the ecliptic (apparent path of the sun) with the celestial equator.

euro: The currency unit of the European Monetary Union. Symbol: €

evanescent: vanishing, disappearing, fleeting

expurgate: Remove matter thought to be objectionable or unsuitable from (a book or account)

facetious: Treating serious issues with deliberately inappropriate humor; flippant.

fatuous: Obnoxiously stupid, vacantly silly, content in one's foolishness.

feckless: Lacking purpose.

fiduciary: One who holds a thing in trust for another; a trustee.

filibuster: Act in an obstructive manner in a legislature, esp. by speaking at inordinate length

gamete: A reproductive cell (male (sperm) or female (egg)) that has only half the usual number of chromosomes.

gauche: Awkward or lacking in social graces; bumbling.

gerrymander: To divide a geographic area into voting districts in such a way as to give an unfair advantage to one party in an election.

hegemony: Domination, influence, or authority over another, especially by one political group over a society or by one nation over others

hemoglobin: The iron-containing substance in red blood cells that transports oxygen from the lungs to the rest of the body;

homogeneous: similar, or the same as something else

hubris: Excessive pride, presumption or arrogance (originally toward the gods).

hypotenuse: The side of a right triangle opposite the right angle.

impeach: Call into question the integrity or validity of (a practice)

incognito: Without being known; in disguise; in an assumed character, or under an assumed title

incontrovertible: Not capable of being denied, challenged, or disputed; closed to questioning.

inculcate: To teach by repeated instruction.

infrastructure: An underlying base or foundation especially for an organization or system

interpolate: To estimate the value of a function between two points between which it is tabulated.

irony: A statement that, when taken in context, may actually mean something different than, or the opposite of what is written literally;

jejune: Lacking matter; empty; devoid of substance.

kinetic: Of or relating to motion

kowtow: To kneel and bow low enough to touch one’s forehead to the ground.

laissez faire: A policy of governmental non-interference in economic affairs.

lexicon: The vocabulary of a person, language, or branch of knowledge

loquacious: Talkative or chatty, especially of persons given to excess conversation.

lugubrious: gloomy, mournful or dismal, especially to an exaggerated degree.

metamorphosis: A transformation, such as that of magic or by sorcery

mitosis: The division of a cell nucleus in which the genome is copied and separated into two identical halves. It is normally followed by cell division.

moiety: Half; Each of two parts into which a thing is or can be divided

nanotechnology: the science and technology of creating nanoparticles and of manufacturing machines which have sizes within the range of .1 to 100 nanometres

nihilism: Extreme skepticism, maintaining that nothing has a real existence.

nomenclature: A name.

nonsectarian: Not involving or relating to a specific religious sect or political group

notarize: Have (a document) legalized by a notary

obsequious: Obedient or attentive to an excessive or servile degree

oligarchy: A government run by only a few, often the wealthy.

omnipotent: Having unlimited power, force or authority.

orthography: The study of correct spelling according to established usage.

oxidize: Combine or become combined chemically with oxygen

parabola: A symmetrical open plane curve formed by the intersection of a cone with a plane parallel to its side

paradigm: An example serving as a model or pattern.

parameter: A variable kept constant during an experiment, calculation or similar.

pecuniary: Of, or relating to, money; monetary.

photosynthesis: The process by which plants and other photoautotrophs generate carbohydrates and oxygen from carbon dioxide, water, and light energy in chloroplasts.

plagiarize: To use, and pass off as one's own, someone else's writing/speech.

plasma: A state of matter consisting of partially ionized gas

polymer: A long or larger molecule consisting of a chain or network of many repeating units, formed by chemically bonding together many identical or similar small molecules called monomers.

precipitous: Steep, like a precipice; as, a precipitous cliff or mountain.

quasar: An extragalactic object, starlike in appearance, that is among the most luminous and thought to be the most distant objects in the universe.

quotidian: daily; occurring or recurring every day.

recapitulate: to summarize or repeat in concise form

reciprocal: Of an action, feeling, etc, done, felt, etc, by each of two people to, on or towards the other.

reparation: A payment of time, effort or money to undo past transgression(s).

respiration: The process of inhaling and exhaling; breathing, breath.

sanguine: Having the colour of blood; red.

soliloquy: The act of a character speaking to himself so as to reveal his thoughts to the audience.

subjugate: To forcibly impose obedience or servitude.

suffragist: A person who promotes suffrage.

supercilious: showing contemptuous indifference; haughty.

tautology: The saying of the same thing twice in different words, generally considered to be a fault of style (e.g., they arrived one after the other in succession)

taxonomy: The science of finding, describing, classifying and naming organisms.

tectonic: Of or relating to the structure of the earth's crust and the large-scale processes that take place within it

tempestuous: stormy, tumultuous.

thermodynamics: The science of the conversions between heat and other forms of energy.

totalitarian: Of or relating to a system of government that is centralized and dictatorial and requires complete subservience to the state

unctuous: Oily or greasy.

usurp: To seize power from another, usually by illegitimate means.

vacuous: Showing a lack of thought or intelligence; vacant

vehement: Showing strong feelings; passionate; forceful or intense.

vortex: A whirlwind, whirlpool, or similarly moving matter in the form of a spiral or column.

winnow: Reduce the number in a set of (people or things) gradually until only the best ones are left

wrought: Having been worked or prepared somehow.

xenophobe: One who fears people who are different from oneself, especially in the case of foreign people

yeoman: An official providing honorable service in a royal or high noble household, ranking between a squire and a page.

ziggurat: A temple tower of the ancient Mesopotamian valley, having the form of a terraced pyramid of successively receding stories.