Author Topic: Word of the Day for Wednesday, September 5, 2012  (Read 284 times)

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Offline Bondai

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Word of the Day for Wednesday, September 5, 2012
« on: September 05, 2012, 09:32:13 AM »
cacology \ka-KOL-uh-jee\, noun:

Defectively produced speech; socially unacceptable diction.

As to prose, I don't know Addison's from Johnson's; but I will try to mend my cacology.
-- Lord Byron, The Works and Letters of Lord Byron
Such cacology drives some people to distraction.

-- Linton Weeks, "R Grammar Gaffes Ruining the Language? Maybe Not", NPR

Cacology comes from the root caco- meaning "bad." This prefix occurs in loanwords from Greek. Similarly the suffix -logy is a combining form used in the names of sciences and bodies of knowledge.


"It's mercy, compassion, and forgiveness I lack; not rationality".