It's the word of the day for February 1st.

Today's word is disputatious.

Spell D-I-S-P-U-T-A-T-I-O-U-S.

Disputatious is an adjective.

It's a formal word used to describe someone who often

disagrees and argues with other people. In other words, someone inclined to dispute. It can also

describe something marked or characterized by arguments or controversies or something that provokes debate

or controversy.

Here's the word used in a sentence from the Atlantic by Paul Post.

The 1990s were especially disputatious. Civil wars arose on multiple continents, as did major wars in Europe and Africa. Quarlesome, contentious, polemical, the English language sure loves

a multisyllabic word to describe your tetre types. And who are we to argue? Disputatious is

another lengthy adjective applied to people who like to start arguments or find something to

disagree about, and it can be used to

characterize situations and issues as well. For example, court trials are disputatious, that is,

they are marked by the action of disputing, and an issue or matter is disputatious if it

provokes controversy. However, if a matter such as an assertion made by someone

is open to question rather than downright controversial, it's merely disputable. In any case,

there's no arguing that disputatious, dispute, and disputable have diverged somewhat in meaning

from their Latin source. The verb disbueirae means simply to

discuss. With your word of the day, I'm Peter Sokolowski.

Visit Miriamwebster.com today for definitions, wordplay, and trending word lookups.