The Words of the Week - May 10

‘Parasite’

Parasite spiked in lookups last week, following news reports that a candidate for the presidency of the United States had previously claimed to have such a creature nibble away some of his gray matter.

The presidential candidate has faced previously undisclosed health issues, including a parasite that he said ate part of his brain.
— The New York Times, 8 May 2024

The literal meaning of parasite is “an organism living in, with, or on another organism in an intimate association in which it obtains benefits from the host organism which it usually injures.” However, it has another, highly figurative, meaning, that we define as “a person who exploits the hospitality of the rich and earns welcome by flattery.” This word is one of the relatively few for which the figurative sense came first: we’ve been referring to social parasites as such since the early 16th century, and the scientific term did not enter English for another 200 years.

So lykewise we if we here any man say that our fortune is bare & wretched, for that we have nouther the consulship nor other maistershippe, we may say unto hym that our fortune is fayre and goodly, and that we go nat from dore to dore, and that among porters and berers, we wery us nat with burdens nor like flatterers are constrained to be as parasites to princes.
— Tho. Wyatis translatyon of Plutarckes boke, 1528

‘Salacious’

A number of words continued to spike in lookups as a result of Donald Trump’s ongoing trial, among them salacious.

Adult film star Stormy Daniels dished out salacious details of her alleged sexual encounter with former President Donald Trump in 2006 from the witness stand on Tuesday, describing how they met at a celebrity golf tournament and what she says happened when she went to Trump’s Lake Tahoe hotel room.
— Jeremy Herb, Lauren del Valle, and Kara Scannell, CNN, 7 May 2024

We define salacious as “arousing or appealing to sexual desire or imagination” or “lecherous, lustful.” The word may be traced to the Latin salire, meaning “to move spasmodically, to leap,” an origin it shares with the sally of sally forth. It has been in use in English since the middle of the 17th century. The noun form, meaning “the quality or state of being salacious” is either salaciousness or, if you’re feeling a bit frisky, salacity.

‘Dystopian’ & ‘Backlash’

Apple released an advertisement that appears to test whether the maxim ‘there’s no such thing as bad publicity’ holds true in all cases, and dystopian and backlash both saw greatly increased traffic as a result.

Apple’s Soul-Crushing New Ad: Who Thought This Was a Good Idea? The dystopian spot, which depicts the relentless destruction of instruments and artworks, marks a dark turn for the company and begs the question: Will 2024 be like 1984?
— (headline) The Hollywood Reporter, 8 May 2024

It was supposed to be a clever product demonstration for Apple’s latest sleek, artificial-intelligence-powered iPad. But the brand, typically praised for its advertising, sparked a wave of backlash for a commercial that crushes and destroys creative tools.
— Brittaney Kiefer & Rebecca Stewart, Ad Week, 9 May 2024

We define dystopia as “an imagined world or society in which people lead wretched, dehumanized, fearful lives,” and dystopian as the adjective form of this noun. A recent addition to English, appearing around the middle of the 20th century, dystopia is formed by adding the prefix of dys- (meaning “abnormal,” “difficult,” “impaired,” or “bad”) to the end of the word utopia (“a place of ideal perfection especially in laws, government, and social conditions”).

Backlash, in modern use, may be defined as “a strong adverse reaction (as to a recent political or social development).” The word came into use at the beginning of the 19th century, and initially was mainly used in technical settings, with meanings such as “a sudden violent backward movement or reaction” and “the play between adjacent movable parts (as in a series of gears).”

The bottom of the wheel should be at least twelve inches above the sheeting, to prevent the “back lash.”
— The American Farmer (Baltimore, MD), 26 Aug. 1825

Words Worth Knowing: ‘Smell-feast’

Our word worth knowing this week is smell-feast, defined as “one given to finding out and getting invited to good feasts.” This word is a nice synonym of the figurative sense of parasite; if you want a synonym for the literal sense of that word we can offer you infestant (“a visible parasite”).

I am a smelfeaste bellygod,
idle and full of slouthe
A greedie gut, and at a worde,
a servaunte to my tothe.
— Thomas Drant, A Medicinable Morall, 1566