Building a Better Vocabulary

related to the noun habit, as in the clothing worn by religious and

clerical orders. In your vocabulary notebook, highlight the DIS part

of the word, meaning “not,” and the HABI in habille and relate it to

habit, as in: “A nun who is often in dishabille is not in the habit of

wearing her habit properly.”

z 7KH KLJKXWLOLW\ SUH¿[dis- gives you a powerful hook to help

you remember that a large part of the meaning of dishabille is

³QRW ́ .QRZOHGJH RI UHODWLYHO\ IUHTXHQW SUH¿[HV VXFK DVdis-,

can be a great help in learning relatively infrequent, sophisticated

vocabulary words.

z 7KLQNRIWKHSUH¿[HVDQGURRWV\RX¶UHOHDUQLQJLQWKLVFRXUVHDVWKH

tools to turn on your morphological radar—your Latin and Greek

HDUO\ZDUQLQJGHWHFWLRQV\VWHP.QRZLQJWKHVHSUH¿[HVDQGURRWV

will help you identify Latin and Greek word parts, and that can help

you sort out and store the meanings of unfamiliar words.

+LJK8WLOLW\3UH¿[HVdys-, pre-, and post-
z Like the Latin dis SUH¿[ WKH UHHNdys- carries a negative
FRQQRWDWLRQEXWWKHUHHNSUH¿[PHDQV³EDGDEQRUPDORUGLI¿FXOW ́
in such words as dysfunctional, dysentery, dystopia, and dyslexia.

z 7KHSUH¿[pre- is from the Latin preposition prae, which means

“before” in such words as preview, premature, and even SUH¿[.

z 7KHSUH¿[post- is from the Latin preposition post, which means

“after” in such words as postmortem and postgame.

Prescient (adjective)

3HUFHLYLQJWKHVLJQL¿FDQFHRIHYHQWVEHIRUHWKH\KDSSHQ

z You may not hear the preSUH¿[LQprescient because the sound has

changed, but note that the spelling has not, which reminds us of the

spelling-meaning connection.