Rare Words to Enhance Writing and Speech

Rare Words to Enhance Writing and Speech

• Accismus is pretending disinterest in something you secretly want.
• Acumen is demonstrating intelligence and quick learning.
• Anachronistic describes something out of place in its historical context.
• Anthropomorphizing involves giving human characteristics to inanimate objects.
• Apricate means to bask in the sunshine.
• Bastion is a well-defended place or upholder of principles.
• Behoove is a verb meaning to be necessary or appropriate.
• Burgeoning describes something that is growing noticeably.
• Convivial describes someone or something that is enjoyable company.
• Conundrum is a problem without a clear solution.
• Credulity describes gullibility or a willingness to believe without proof.
• Crepuscular describes animals active during dawn and dusk.
• Edify means to educate or improve someone morally or intellectually.
• Effete describes something overly refined to the point of uselessness.
• Egregious refers to something exceptionally bad or negative.
• Eschewing means intentionally avoiding something.
• Fatuous describes something foolish or silly.
• Fractious describes something difficult to control and bad-tempered.
• Galvanize means to stimulate someone to action.
• Imperious describes someone bossy and domineering without reason.
• Impetus is something that causes something else to happen.
• Insouciant describes someone calm and unconcerned by daily worries.
• Interlocutors are the participants in a conversation.
• Lionize means to treat someone as a hero.
• Melange is a mixture of seemingly unrelated things.
• Metanoia describes a fundamental shift in someone's perspective.
• Myriad means a large number of diverse elements.
• Noisome describes something harmful, irritating, or smelly.
• Obfuscate means to make something more confusing than it needs to be.
• Odious describes something horrible, unpleasant, or disgusting.
• ** Ostensibly** means appearing to be true.
• Paucity refers to a lack of something, especially evidence.
• Penultimate describes the second to last thing in a series.
• Pernicious describes something extremely destructive or harmful.
• Perspicacious describes someone with good judgement and clear thinking.
• Philistine describes someone closed-minded and uninterested in culture.
• Prevaricating refers to someone who avoids direct answers.
• Rapscallions are playful and mischievous people.
• Sagacious describes someone wise with good judgement.
• Sanguine describes someone cheerful and confident.
• Serendipity is a happy accident.
• Solipsist describes someone extremely self-absorbed.
• Synecdoche is a figure of speech where a part represents a whole.
• Timorous describes someone scared, fearful, or shy.
• Ubiquitous describes something that is everywhere at once.
• Uhtceare describes anxiety experienced before dawn.
• Ultracrepidarian describes someone who gives opinions beyond their knowledge.
• Verisimilitude refers to something looking like the real thing.
• Visceral describes a deep emotional reaction.
• Zeugma is a figure of speech with a word having double meaning in a sentence.