Acid is from the Latin adjective acidus, meaning ‘sharp, sour’. It has the same root as acer – keen, sharp. Even in Latin acid(us) had both modern meaning: ‘sour-tasting’ and ‘sour in temperament, disagreeable’. From acid come words such as acidify and acidity.
Acrid also uses the Latin suffix -id, meaning ‘with a particular quality’. Acrid is used mainly to describe smells and tastes: acrid smoke.
Acerbic comments are harsh, bitter, and cutting. They might be made during an acrimonious dispute – one full of bitterness and acrimony.
Acute comes from a Latin word meaning ‘sharpened’ or’ coming to a sharp point’. So an acute angle is one that is less than 90 degrees. Hence the word came to mean ‘reaching a crisis, critical’ and also ‘intense, to the point’. We speak of a problem as becoming acute; of a toothache as giving us acute pain; or of a person as having an acute mind or being acutely aware of something.
Acuity is sharpness of mind and quickness of understanding. Acumen too, though it is usually a long-term quality, like shrewdness.
Acupuncture is the sharp puncturing of the skin with needles.
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To condone is to forgive, overlook, pardon, or be uncritical of (an offence, or of an antisocial or illegal act). You yourself might or might not indulge in such behaviour or commit such an offence, but you feel no urge to protest, or to demand censure or punishment for someone else who does. You may condone cheating on one’s income tax, shoplifting from a big, impersonal supermarket, or exceeding the speed limit, though you personally observe the law with scrupulousness. (Note everyone, however, is so charitable or forgiving.) The noun is condonation.
Condone is built on Latin dono, to give, the root found in donor, one who gives; donate, to give; and donation, a gift.
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Some words are restricted to very particular uses. If you have learnt a word in one grammatical context, don’t automatically assume that you can use it in another context.
Suppose you come across a sentence like this: Michelangelo was a consummate draughtsman. You look up consummate. Your dictionary tells you it mean’s supremely accomplished or skilled’. This is true enough, as far as it goes.
A few days later, when the right opportunity presents itself, you glibly announce that ?? Michelangelo’s draughtsmanship was consummate.
Unfortunately you have overstepped the grammatical limitations on the word. Consummate is not, as the dictionary seems to suggest, an adjective like accomplished and skilful that can be used either before or after the noun it refers to. It can be used only in certain positions in the sentence. Consider these two sentences: He’s an utter idiot; X This idiot is utter. The second is clearly wrong. Utter can be used only before the noun it qualifies. So too with consummate above.
To avoid such confusions, try to keep your first attempts at using a new word close to the way it was used when you made its acquaintance. As you come to hear or read it more often, so you will come to be increasingly confident of its grammar.
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Militate derives from militis, one of the forms of the Latin noun meaning soldier or fighting man. If something militates against you, it fights against you, i.e., works to your disadvantage. Thus, your timidity may militate against your keeping your friends. (Militate is always followed by the preposition against and, like obviate, never takes a personal subject – you don’t militate against anyone, but some habit, action, tendency, etc. militates against someone or something.).
The adjective militant comes from the same root. A militant reformer is one who fights for reforms; a militant campaign is one waged aggressively and with determination. The noun is militancy, and militant is also a noun for the person – ‘ Sally is a militant in the Women’s Liberation movement’.
Military and militia also have their origin in militis.
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The English used in black Africa varies widely from place to place, and often has features of the local languages. As English is often taught first as a written language, the spoken language, as in South Asia, is often somewhat archaic and florid. It is also often marked by pronunciations that stick more carefully than is normal elsewhere to the spelling of words, such as the habit of sounding the L In words like walk and calm and the b in climb and comb.
Where necessary, African English has borrowed from local languages words for local phenomena. In West Africa oga means ‘a boss or superior’ and fon a ‘chief’. Kente is the colourful cloth used to make robes in Ghana. Certain local words taken into English are known outside Africa. Bwana (boss) and uhuru (freedom) are from Swahili, though both probably originate in Arabic. Others have passed into Standard English: they include words such as safari (also from Arabic via Swahili), banana, banjo, chimpanzee, cola, voodoo, yam, and Zombic from various West African languages.
Many dialects include direct translations into English of local expressions. To enstool in Ghana means to choose and invest as chief; if you have long legs you have power or influence; outdooring is a traditional name-giving ceremony; if you are a native of something in East Africa you do or eat it often. In parts of Africa speakers have also created new expressions in English. A go-slow can be a traffic jam; senior brother is used for elder brother; and a been-to is someone who has been abroad, usually to study.
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