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🗓️ 25 December 2023
⏱️ 2 minutes
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Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for December 25, 2023 is:
envisage • \in-VIZ-ij\ • verb
To envisage something is to picture it in your mind, or to view or regard something in a particular way.
// She envisages many positive changes and opportunities in the New Year.
Examples:
“Amid all his onscreen work, [Sheb] Wooley never stopped writing songs. And the one that took off … was ‘The Purple People Eater,’ which skewered the musical crazes of the time by envisaging a grotesque space invader taking the bait.” — Morgan Enos, UDiscoverMusic.com, 31 Oct. 2023
Did you know?
Envisage this: a word is borrowed from French in the mid-17th century and sticks around to be used in the 21st. It’s not hard to picture; envisage is not alone in this accomplishment. Used today to mean “to have a mental picture of something, especially in advance of realization” and “to view or regard something in a certain way,” envisage for a time could also mean “to confront or face someone.” That use, which is now archaic, nods to the word’s origin: we borrowed envisage from French, but the visage part is from Anglo-French vis, meaning “face.” (It reaches back ultimately to Greek idein, “to see.”) Visage is of course also an English word. It entered English much earlier, in the 14th century, and is typically used today in literary contexts to refer to a person’s face. Envisage isn’t necessarily restricted to literary contexts, but it does have a formal tone. Its near twin envision (“to picture to oneself”), which has been with us since the 19th century, is interchangeable with envisage in many contexts and is somewhat less formal.
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0:00.0 | It's Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for December 25th. |
0:11.2 | Today's word is Envisage, spelled EN-V-. Vizage is a verb. To envisage something is to |
0:18.9 | picture it in your mind or to view or regard something in a particular way. |
0:24.0 | Here's the word used in a sentence from you Discover Music.com by Morganinos. |
0:29.5 | Amid all his on-screen work, Shebb-Wully never stopped writing songs. |
0:35.1 | And the one that took off was the purple people eater, which skewered the musical crazes |
0:40.2 | of the time by envisaging a grotesque space invader taking the bait. |
0:45.0 | Invisage this. A word is borrowed from French in the mid-1600s |
0:51.0 | and sticks around to be used in the 21st century. |
0:55.0 | It's not hard to picture. |
0:57.0 | The word envisage isn't alone in this accomplishment. |
1:00.0 | Used today to mean to have a mental picture of something, especially in advance of realization, |
1:06.4 | and to view or regard something in a certain way, envisage for a time could also mean to confront or face someone. |
1:14.8 | That use, which is now archaic, nods to the words origin. |
1:19.0 | We borrowed Invisage from French, but the Visage part is Anglo-french, the word vise meaning face. |
1:26.4 | It reaches back ultimately to the Greek word Idien meaning to see. |
1:31.7 | Visage is of course also an English word. It entered English much earlier in the 14th century and is typically used today in literary contexts to refer to a person's face. Invizage isn't necessarily restricted to literary contexts, |
1:46.0 | but it does have a formal tone. |
1:48.0 | Its near-twin envision, meaning to picture to oneself, |
1:52.0 | which has been with us since the 19th century, |
1:55.0 | is interchangeable with envisage in many contexts and is somewhat less formal. |
2:00.0 | With your word of the day, I'm Peter Sokolowski. |
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