DOUG'S WORD OF THE WEEK

edacious / i-DAY-shuhs / adjective : 1. Devouring; voracious.


Notes & Etymology: From the Latin edere (to eat). Ultimately from the Indo-European root ed- (to eat, to bite) that has given other words such as edible, comestible, obese, etch, fret, and postprandial.

Usage: “For too many years my edacious reading habits had been leading me into one unappealing corner after another, dank cul-de-sacs littered with tear-stained diaries, empty pill bottles, bulging briefcases, broken vows, humdrum phrases, sociological swab samples, and the (lovely?) bones of dismembered children. ”
Tom Robbins; In Defiance of Gravity; Harper's (New York); Sep 2004.

DOUG'S WORD OF THE WEEK

ex cathedra / eks kuh-THEE-druh / adverb, adjective: 1. Spoken with authority; with the authority of the office.

Notes & Etymology: From the Latin ex cathedra (from the chair), from cathedra (chair). In the Roman Catholic Church, when the Pope speaks ex cathedra he is considered infallible. The word cathedral is short for the full term cathedral church, meaning the principal church of a diocese, one containing a bishop's throne. The term is often used ironically or sarcastically to describe self-certain statements

Usage: “The Supreme Court's ex cathedra pronouncement that the area is not riverbed or floodplain commits two errors. ”
Ramaswamy R. Iyer; Let the Games Go On; The Indian Express (New Delhi, India); Aug 4, 2009

propinquity

Doug's Word of the Week

(Note: Doug claims that his word offerings are not intended to have any political or cultural subtext whatsoever.)

propinquity / pro-PING-kwi-tee /noun: 1. Nearness in space, time or relationship

Notes & Etymology: From the Middle English propinquite, from the Latin propinquitas (nearness), from prope (near).

Usage: "I believe that ... propinquity of descent, -- the only known cause of the similarity of organic beings, -- is the bond, hidden as it is by various degrees of modification, which is partially revealed to us by our classifications. "

Charles Darwin; On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection; 1859.

Use this word in conversation at least twice in the coming week and it's yours forever!