15 May 2011

Do you know these words?

I read a tweet yesterday that said something to the effect of, "Open a dictionary, even if you know the word," which reminded me of studying for the GRE. While studying for the Verbal section, I read over the Hit Parade (a compilation of vocabulary words that are frequently tested on the GRE) and was surprised by how many I did not know.  Now, I knew the words, but not the actual dictionary version of the word.

My point?  Maybe whoever wrote that tweet yesterday had it right.  Maybe, as writers, we need to refer to our dictionarys more often to make sure we know what we're writing about.

I've randomly picked six of the words from the Hit Parade.  I'm going to post them below and then will post the definitions tomorrow.  Come back to see if you got them right!  And NO cheating! haha :)

1. Alacrity
2. Hackneyed
3. Specious
4. Garrulous
5. Trenchant
6. Obfuscate

5 comments:

  1. I'm pretty sure I know all of them, although I may be a little hazy on trenchant....

    Will be looking forward to finding out if I'm right!

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  2. Alright, I'll bite - and even risk public humiliation:

    1. Speed; ease
    2. Overused, trite, contrived, cliched
    3. Not entirely accurate, founded upon questionable reasoning
    4. Talkative, wordy
    5. Deep-rooted
    6. To obscure, make cloudy or confuse

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oooo, I stink at this. Google, and dictionary.com are my best friends:)

    ReplyDelete
  4. Don't worry, Deana. Kate and Sophia have completely showed me up. I live by Google.

    ReplyDelete