NOMADIC WORDS (WORDS #8)

HULLO!

Hydrangeas from Pixabay

NOVICE

 

Noun (countable)  (1)  Someone who is just beginning to learn a skill or subject

                          (2) A member of a religious community who is not yet a full member

Climbing that mountain peak is not recommended for a novice

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 NETTLE

Noun (countable)  A plant with pointed leaves and small hairs that sting if you touch them

Be careful, this field is full of nettles. They can be painful if touched.

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NEFARIOUS

Adjective (formal)  Evil, or dishonest

The police worked hard to stop the murderer’s nefarious plans

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NIGGARDLY

Adjective (formal)  (1) Not generous, or not willing to spend money

                           (2)  Used to describe a small amount of money

The salaries he pays are very niggardly

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MY COMMENTS ON THESE WORDS

An amazing collection of words! They are taken from the list of words that are described as being so important for success on the graduate entry tests. I’m sure you will agree that at times this list is rather bizarre. 

There! Now I’m doing it! In case you didn’t know, the word “bizarre” means weird, strange. And (you’ve guessed it!) it’s also on this famous list of words.

I’m proud to say I was familiar with all four of them; I really must have done a LOT of reading during my long life! But once again I have to say that I would not use “nefarious” and “niggardly in every-day writing or speaking.

“Nettle” isn’t so bad; we’ve all probably seen nettles growing wild in the countryside. But there’s more to this particular word, it’s also a verb that means the same as “irritate”. 

A person can be irritated = A person can be nettled

The GRE test questions just love to introduce what they call the “secondary meaning” of certain words, just to confuse the test takers a bit more. This is especially true on the multiple choice questions, and most test takers fall into the trap, because they tend to discard a word because they have associated it to the better known meaning of that word without realizing that on the test it’s being used with its secondary meaning.

I think the easiest word here is “novice” and it’s good for Spanish speakers too. There’s a similar word in that language, it’s novicia.

So once again I will repeat that you really need to study up these words if you want to improve your score on the graduate English tests.

See you at my next post!

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© 2013  joanveronica  (Joan Robertson)

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