Lecture 35: More Foreign Loan Words

More Foreign Loan Words

Lecture 35

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s we saw in our last lecture, English has borrowed many words from

many different languages. However, the hallmark of a powerful

vocabulary is not simply knowing a bunch of fancy words; rather,

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why we’ve spent so much time in this course delving into the meanings of

words and exploring how each word differs in meaning from closely related

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longest or most sophisticated word that is the best choice but the word that is

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Mot juste (noun)

The exact, appropriate word or expression for a situation.

z Mark Twain once said, “The difference between the almost right

word and the right word is really a large matter—’tis the difference

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mot juste, captures this idea of the “just right word.”

z Consider, for example, this well-known line from President John F.

Kennedy’s 1961 inaugural address: “Ask not what your country can

do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”

ż Changing just one word changes the feel of the entire sentence:

“Request not what your country can do for you, request what

you can do for your country.” $VN, a shorter and some might

say less sophisticated word than request, is actually the better

choice in this instance.

ż The reason DVN is the better choice here relates to the fact that

there is no such thing as an exact synonym in English. Words

may carry similar denotations (primary, literal meanings),