English Language
ONE- WORD SUBSTITUTES
(For competitive exams and to improve Vocabulary)
Aborigines: The original inhabitants of a place.
Accomplice : A partner in crime.
Acquisitive : Eager to own and collect things.
Acumen :An ability to make good judgements and take quick decisions.
Affliction :Physical or mental distress, especially pain or illness
Aftermath :Consequences or after-effects of a significant and unpleasant event.
Agony : Extreme mental or physical suffering.
Alien :A foreigner or a being from another world; unfamiliar.
Allusion : An indirect or passing reference.
Almanac :An annual calendar of months and days with astronomical data and tide
tables.
Ambience :The surroundings or atmosphere of a place.
Ambiguous : Capable of interpreting in two ways ; of double meaning.
Ambidextrous : Able to use the right hand as well as the left.
Amphibian :Living both on land and in water.
Anachronism : Something attributed to a wrong period of time; something out of
harmony with the present time.
Anniversary: Yearly return of a particular date.
Anonymous : Of unknown name, or undeclared authorship.
Antibiotic :Capable of destroying bacteria.
Antidote :Medicine given to counteract poison or disease.
Antiquary :Collector of ancient relics.
Antique :Collectable object such as a piece of furniture or work of art that has a high
value because of its age and quality.
Antiseptic :That prevents the growth of disease-causing microorganisms.
Aquarium :Artificial pond or tank for keeping live fish, water plants, etc.
Arbitrary :Based on random choice or personal whims, rather than any reason or system.
Arcade :A passage with an arched roof.
Archaeology :Study of antiquities, especially of the prehistoric period.
1. AMUSING DEFINITIONS
(Collected from ‘WISDOM’ old Editions)
A bore :A person who insists on talking about himself when you want to talk about
yourself./ A person who talks when you want to.
Abstract Art :That which uses a variety of means to express nothing.
Actor :A man who tries to be everything except himself.
Acquaintance :A person we know well enough to borrow from but not well enough to
lend.
Adolescence :The period when children are certain they will never be as stupid as their parents. / The age when a girl’s voice changes from no to yes; when children start bringing up their parents. / The time when children begin to question the answers. / Is that period when a youngster apologises to his friends for having old-fashioned parents.
Adult:A person who has stopped growing at both ends and started growing in the
middle.
Advertisement :The art of making people buy without knowing why./ The science of arresting the human intelligence long enough to get money from it.
Advice :Something that the wise do not need and the fools will not take./ Information given by someone who can’t use it to someone who won’t./ The only commodity which you are more interested in giving away to others than receiving from them.
Alcohol:A liquid that is good for preserving most things except secrets.
Amateur:A person who is always willing to give you the benefit of hisinexperience.
Analyst:A man who takes forty-nine documents and from themproduces a fiftieth.
Anger: It is one letter short of ‘danger’.
Answers : What we have for other people’s problems.
LANGUAGE AND ITS ORIGIN
AND
GROWTH OFENGLISH LANGUAGE
(Notes given by Prof. YashwanthRaoJadhav, L. B. College,
Sagar )
THE NATURE OF LANGUAGE
Language is a medium of communication. It implies that there
are two or more persons between whom an exchange of thoughts, feelings, ideas
and experiences takes place. For this to happen, a medium or a vehicle is
needed and that medium is language.
Language, in its general sense, includes many different
forms of communication. For example, dance, music, visual art etc., are all as
much forms of language as either English or Kannada. All these basically
transmit experience and information from one person to another. Of course, they
do it by their own individually different means and methods. Kannada or English
use spoken sounds as elements of their language. While dance uses movement and
gesture and painting uses shapes, lines and colours. Each medium has a different
system of arranging its elements. For example, the spoken sound elements of
English or Kannada are arranged along the time axis, while a painting arranges
its elements along the spatial axis, which means that even a simple single
sentence in spoken or written language unfolds itself in time. On the other
hand, a painting already exists in its full form and it does not unfold in time
but in space.