Vocabulary Level H

Unit 5

aficionado – (n) an enthusiastic and usually expert follower or fan

Ex: My father, after years of wine tasting and wine making, is considered an aficionado of fine wines and champagnes.

browbeat – (v) to bully

ex: Browbeating your enemy will not make him like you; instead, try to see the world from his point of view!

commensurate – (adj) measurable by the same standards; proportionate

ex: Standardized tests like the SATs ensure that all student evaluations are commensurate for college admissions.

diaphanous – (adj) almost completely transparent; translucent, gossamer

Ex: The seamstress worked meticulously to avoid tearing the diaphanous lace of the veil.

emolument – (n) a fee or salary

ex: Teachers receive emolument commensurate with the number of years’ experience they have.

foray – (n) a venture into some field of endeavor

ex: My foray into the art of dance was unsuccessful, as it seems I have two left feet!

genre – (n) a type, class, or variety, especially in a distinctive category of

literary composition

ex: Being able to identify the genre of a piece of writing will help you know how to punctuate it. For example, a novel title is underlined while a short story title is placed in quotation marks.

homily – (n) a sermon stressing moral principles; a tedious moralizing

lecture or discourse

Ex: Many works of Puritan writing are homilies of the strict code by which they lived.

immure – (v) to seclude or isolate; to imprison

ex: The heavy snow immured us by preventing travel for a week!

insouciant – (adj) carefree; happy-go-lucky

ex: She may act insouciant today, but when her grades slip and the college of her choice rejects her, she’s going to wish she had paid more attention this semester.

matrix – (n) a mold; a pattern or model

ex: The teacher provided a matrix for the students to use as a starting point when solving the complex problem.

obsequies – (n) funeral rites or ceremonies

ex: When a figure of national importance dies, the obsequies are usually broadcast for all to see.

panache – (n) a confident and stylish manner; style

ex: These days, the cool thing is not to just resign, but to quit with panache, like the Jet Blue flight attendant who pulled the emergency slide ripcord to make his exit.

persona – (n) the outward character or role that a person assumes

Ex: Clark Kent’s persona was that of an awkward, mild-mannered reporter; no one knew he was secretly Superman!

philippic – (n) a bitter verbal attack

ex: Carrie Underwood’s song “Before He Cheats” delivers a philippic describing the physical punishment a man’s truck would receive if he ever cheated on her.

prurient – (adj) tending to arouse sexual desires

ex: Many forms of censorship are concerned with prohibiting prurient materials from falling into the hands of young people.

sacrosanct – (adj) very holy or sacred

Ex: Jerusalem is deemed a sacrosanct city as it is the birthplace of many religions’ fundamental ideas.

systemic – (adj) relating to a system or systems

Ex: The company planned a systemic change in order to increase sales; it made alterations to every department at every level in an effort to improve.

tendentious – (adj) biased or partisan; intended to promote a particular

point of view

Ex: America embroils politics and entertainment so deeply that Bristol Palin’s Dancing With the Stars stint is being seen by some as a tendentious Tea Party ploy.

vicissitude – (n) a change, variation, or alteration; (pl) successive or changing

phases or conditions

ex: Early childhood development classes are designed to explore the vicissitudes of human growth between birth and school-age.