Vocabulary Mnemonics

January 25, 2025

Matt’s words

Bonhomie (n): (bänəmē)friendly; cheerful; good-natured

He radiated bonhomie.

You can see the bonhomie in his face.

Mnemonic 1: bon = good, homme = man

Mnemonic 2: bon = good, homie = homie

Dilettante (n): amateur; someone interested in a subject but only superficially (but pretends to be very knowledgeable); dabbler

I recently spent a week in Alaska trying to learn how to be a mountaineer. I did not succeed very well, and the details are not very interesting. I finished the course (I was enrolled in a course) thinking that perhaps I am better off remaining a slightly-above-average mountain dilettante. An occasional rock climber. —Jason Lee Steorts, National Review, 18 Aug. 2008

Mnemonic: A dilettante likes to dilly dally.

Elan (n):  vigorous spirit; enthusiasm; flair

They attacked the position with elan.

The Orioles finished the Yankees not with their trademark power but with base running elan. —Childs Walker, Baltimore Sun, 21 June 2024

Mnemonic: Think of Elon Musk.

Fait accompli (n):a thing accomplished and presumed irreversible

Before this rebel resurgence, Assad’s survival seemed a fait accompli. —Nabih Bulos, Los Angeles Times, 4 Dec. 2024

We tried our fight back, but we could tell it was a fate accompli.

Mnemonic: Think “accomplished fact,” or just think that it’s fate that something will be accomplished.

Malinger (v):fake sick; exaggerate an illness

His teacher thought he was malingering, but it turns out he was actually sick.

The entire day felt dehumanizing, as if her nearly eight years with the company, her medical problems and her physical pain had been reduced to nothing more than malingering and scattered incidents of tardiness. —Greg Jaffe, Anchorage Daily News, 18 June 2023

Mnemonic: Mal means bad. Combine that with lingering and you have someone doing some bad lingering.

Dr. Mom’s words

Obesiance (n): deferential respect, sometimes literally indicated by a bow, curtsy or genuflection; adoration; often with “paid”

A stereotype would be that the hoity toity expect obeisance from the hoi polloi.

Her obeisance to her boss did not cross the line into obsequiousness, thank goodness.

Mnemonic: From the Anglo-French word obeir, meaning “to obey.” It also looks like “obedience,” so you “obey, in a sense,” or go along with, what another suggests.

Redound (v): to contribute greatly to a person’s credit/honor

The structural changes instituted by the new CEO may not redound to the company’s benefit.

Mnemonic: Sounds like rebound, as in come back to you, or as in karma (what goes around comes around). You do something good, and it rebounds all that goodwill back to you, or redounds to your benefit.

Blandishment (n): a flattering or pleasing statement or action used to persuade gently

It didn’t take much blandishment to persuade the teenage boy to take back his gorgeous but unfaithful girlfriend.

Mnemonic: Think of a “bland dish meant” to get you accustomed to a food. It seems harmless (because it’s bland at first), and eventually you are persuaded to eat more and more of it even as it may become less tasty.

Eidetic (adj): mental images so vivid and detailed as to seem actually visible; a photographic memory

It was uncanny to see the actor with an eidetic memory recite a script he had read through only once. (This was said of actor Jackie Gleason, star of an old TV comedy.)

Mnemonic: With one look with her “eye,” she “gets it.” If you have an eidetic memory, your eye gets and retains it (the image) perfectly.

Plenipotentiary (n): a diplomat or person with full power of independent action on behalf of a government

Bill Belichick’s plenipotentiary football power, which produced several Super Bowl championships, was extreme among his peers.

Mnemonic: Break the word down into “plenty of potency (power).”

COLOSSAL COMPILATION:

Despite his eidetic memory, bonhomie-ish manner, appropriate obeisance to his betters, and general elan for life, the plenipotentiary nonetheless had his demons that didn’t redound to him, such as a tendency toward malingering, using blandishments, and–worst of all–deep down believing it a fait accompli that he would ever be something of a dilettante.