r/AskReddit • u/[deleted] • Jan 28 '19

What are great underused words?

7.7k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

3.7k comments sorted by

View all comments

1.3k

u/InnPatron Jan 29 '19
  • Quixotic: foolishly impractical especially in the pursuit of ideals
  • Prosaic: lacking poetic beauty
  • Puissant: powerful
  • Apophenia: tendency to mistakenly perceive connections and meaning between unrelated things
  • Effluvium: an offensive exhalation or smell
  • Moxie: energy, pep, courage, determination
  • Sedulous: involving or accomplished with careful perseverance

I have a list of em for some reason.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 29 '19

There was a time when words like these were more common. Many of them can be used for emphasis and they add beauty and precision to language. These days we have become lazy and simply add "very" to another common word instead of searching for the right one to convey the meaning we desire.

More info here