Difficult Words :
Agenda, Agrarian, Aggregate, Agnostic, Alacrity and Allege
This is a list of Difficult Words: Agenda, Agrarian, Aggregate, Agnostic, Alacrity and Allege
Agenda (uh JEN duh) n: program, the things to be done
• What's on the agenda for the board meeting? A little gossip, then lunch.
• A politician is often said to have an agenda. The politician's agenda consists of the things he or she wishes to accomplish.
• An agenda, such as that for a meeting, is often written down, but it doesn't have to be.
• A person who has sneaky ambitions or plans is often said to have a secret or hidden agenda.
Agrarian (uh GRAR ee un) adj: relating to land, relating to the management or farming of land
• Agrarian usually has to do with farming. Think of agriculture. Politics in this country often pit the rural, agrarian interests against the urban interests.
Aggregate (AG ruh git, AG ruh GATE) n: sum total, a collection of separate things mixed together.
• Chili is aggregate of meat and beams.
• Aggregating can also be a verb or an adjective.
• You would make chili by aggregating meat and beans. Chili is an aggregate food.
• Similar and related words include congregate, segregate, and integrate. To aggregate is to bring together, to congregate is to get together, to segregate is to keep apart (or separate), to integrate is to unite.
• A church's congregation is the group of people that gets together inside it on Sunday.
• Racial segregation is the separation of different races.
• School systems in which blacks and whites attend different schools are called segregated.
• The act of opening those schools to members of all races is called integration.
Agnostic (ag NOS tik) n: one who believes that the existence of a god can be neither proved nor disproved
• An atheist is someone who does not believe in a god.
• An agnostic, on the other hand, isn't sure. He doesn't believe but he doesn't not believe, either.
Alacrity (uh LAK ri tee) n: cheerful eagerness or readiness to respond
• David could hardly wait for his parents to leave; he carried their luggage out to the car with great alacrity
Allege (uh LEJ) v: to assert without proof
• If I say, "Bill alleges that I stole his hat," I am saying two things:
1. Bill says I stole his hat
2. I say I didn't do it
• To allege something is to assert it without proving it. Such an assertion is called an allegation.
• If the police accuse someone of having committed a crime, newspapers will usually refer to that person as an alleged criminal. The police have alleged that he or she committed the crime, but a jury hasn't made a decision yet.
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