Week 4

Question 1

clandestine

Answer 1

done secretively, especially to deceive

I met the secret agent in an alleyway, where she handed me the plans for the clandestine operation.

Question 2

ingenuous

Answer 2

lacking in cunning, guile, or worldiness

Janine was so ingenuous that it was too easy for her friends to dupe her.

Question 3

subterfuge

Answer 3

a deceptive stratagem or device

The submarine pilots were trained in the art of subterfuge; the were excellent at faking out their enemies.

Question 4

surreptitious

Answer 4

secretive; sneaky

Sara drank the cough syrup surreptitiously because she didn’t want anyone to know that she was sick

Question 5

dearth

Answer 5

scarce supply; lack

There was a dearth of money in my piggy bank; it collected dust, not bills.

Question 6

modicum

Answer 6

a small, moderate, or token amount

A modicum of effort may result in a small score improvement; in order to improve significantly, however, you must stuyd as often as possible

Question 7

paucity

Answer 7

smallnes in number; scarcity

The struggling city had a paucity of resources and therefore a high level of poverty

Question 8

squander

Answer 8

to spend wastefully

Carrie squandered her savings on shoes and wasn’t able to buy her apartment

Question 9

temperate

Answer 9

moderate; restrained

Temperate climates rarely experience extremes in temperature

Question 10

tenuous

Answer 10

having littlte substance or strength; shaky

Her grasp on reality is tenuousat best; she’s not even sure what year it is

Question 11

diligent

Answer 11

marked by painstaking effort; hardworking

With diligent effort, they were able to finish the model airplane in record time

Question 12

maverick

Answer 12

one who is independent and resists adherence to a group

In the movie Top Gun, Tom Cruise played a maverick who often broke rules and did things his own way

Question 13

mercenary

Answer 13

motivated soley be a desire for money or material gain; a professional soldier

During the war, Mercer was a mercenary; he’d fight for whichever side paid him the most for his services

Question 14

obstinate

Answer 14

stubbornly attached to an opinion or a course of action

Despite Jeremy’s broken leg, his parents were obstinate; they steadfastly refused to buy him an Xbox.

Question 15

proliferate

Answer 15

to grow or increase rapidly

Because fax machines, pagers, and cell phones have proliferated in recent years, many new area codes have been created to handle the demand for phone numbers.

Question 16

tenacity

Answer 16

persistence

With his overwhelming tenacity, Clark was finally able to interview Brad Pitt for the school newspaper.

Question 17

vigilant

Answer 17

on the alert; watchful

The participants of the candlelight vigil were vigilant, as they had heard that the fraternity across the street was planning to egg them

Question 18

extraneous

Answer 18

irrelevant; inessential

The book, though interesting, had so much extraneous information that it was hard to keep track of the important points

Question 19

juxtapose

Answer 19

to place side by side, especially for comparison or contrast

Separately the pictures look identical, but if you juxtapose them, you can see the differences.

Question 20

novel

Answer 20

fresh; original; new

It was a novel idea, the sort of thing no one had tried before

Question 21

superfluous

Answer 21

extra; unnecessary

If there is sugar in your tea, honey would be superfluous

Question 22

synergy

Answer 22

combined action or operation

The synergy of hydrogen and oxygen creates water

Question 23

tangential

Answer 23

merely touching or slightly connected; only superficially relevant

Though Abby’s paper was well written, its thesis was so tangential to its proof that her teacher couldn’t give her a good grade

Question 24

aesthetic

Answer 24

having to do with the appreciation of beauty

Aesthetic considerations determined the arrangement of paintings at the museum; as long as art looked good together, it didn’t matter who had painted it.

Question 25

aural

Answer 25

of or related to the ear or the sense of hearing It should come as no surprise that musicians prefer aural to visual learning

Question 26

cacophony

Answer 26

discordant, unpleasant noise Brian had to shield his ears from the awful cacophony produced by the punk band on stage

Question 27

dirge

Answer 27

a funeral hymn or lament The dirge was so beautiful that everyone cried, even those who hadn't known the deceased

Question 28

eclectic

Answer 28

made up of a variety of sources or styles Lou's taste in music is quite eclectic; he listens to everything from rap to polka

Question 29

incongruous

Answer 29

lacking in harmony; incompatible My chicken and jello soup experiment failed; the tastes were just too incongruous

Question 30

sonorous

Answer 30

producing a deep or full sound My father's sonorous snoring keeps me up all night unless I close my door and wear earplugs

Question 31

strident

Answer 31

loud, harsh, grating, or shrill The strident shouting kept the neighbors awake all night

Question 32

debacle

Answer 32

disastrous or ludicrous defeat or failure; fiasco Jim's interview was a complete debacle; he accidentally locked himself in the bathroom, sneezed on the interviewer multiple times, and knocked over the president of the company

Question 33

debilitate

Answer 33

impair the strength of; weaken Deb ran the NYC marathon without proper training; the experience left her debilitated for weeks

Question 34

tumultuous

Answer 34

noisy and disorderly The tumultuous applause was so deafening that the pianist couldn't hear the singer

Question 35

anachronistic

Answer 35

the representation that something as existing or happening in the wrong time period I noticed an anachronism in the museum's ancient Rome display: a digital clock ticking behind a statue of Venus

Question 36

archaic

Answer 36

characteristic of an earlier time; antiquated; old "How dost thou?" is an archaic way of saying "How are you"

Question 37

dilatory

Answer 37

habitually late Always waiting until the last moment to leave home in the morning, Dylan was a dilatory student

Question 38

ephemeral

Answer 38

lasting for only a brief time The importance of SAT scores is truly ephemeral; when you are applying, they are crucial, but once you get into college, no one cares how well you did.

Question 39

redolent

Answer 39

fragrant; aromatic; suggestive The aroma of apple pie wafted into my room, redolent of weekends spent baking with my grandmother

Question 40

temporal

Answer 40

of, relating to, or limited by time One's enjoyment of a Starubcks mocha latte is bound by temporal limitations; all too soon, the latte is gone

Question 41

onerous

Answer 41

troublesome or oppresive; burdensome The onerous task was so difficult that Ona thought she'd never get through it

Question 42

portent

Answer 42

indication of something important or calamitous about to occurr; omen A red morning sky is a terrible portent for all sailors -- it means that stormy seas are ahead

Question 43

prescience

Answer 43

knowledge of actions or events before they occur; foreknowledge; foresight Preetha's prescience was such that people wondered if she was psychic; how else could she know so much about the future?

Question 44

austere

Answer 44

without decoration; strict The gray walls and bare floors of his monastery cell provided an even more austere setting than Brother Austen had hoped for

Question 45

banal

Answer 45

drearily commonplace; predictable; trite The poet's imagery is so banal that I think she cribbed her work from Poetry for Dummies

Question 46

hackneyed

Answer 46

worn out through overuse; trite All Hal could offer in the way of advice were hackneyed old phrases that I'd already heard a hundred times before.

Question 47

insipid

Answer 47

uninteresting; unchallenging; lacking taste or savor That insipid movie was so predictable that I walked out

Question 48

prosaic

Answer 48

unimaginative; dull Rebecca made a prosaic mosaic consisting of identical, undecorated tiles.

Question 49

soporific

Answer 49

inducing or tending to induce sleep The congressman's speech was so soporific that even his cat was yawning

Question 50

vapid

Answer 50

lacking liveliness, animation, or interest; dull Valerie's date was so vapid that she thought he was sleeping with his eyes open.