Merriam-Webster's Words of the Week - Jan. 7

’Swagger’

Swagger pushed its way into our top lookups this week, after the mayor of New York City appeared to suggest that this was a useful quality in dealing with the continuing pandemic.

New NY Mayor Eric Adams Declares the City Must Learn To "Live With COVID," But Do It With Swagger
— (headline) The Root, 4 Jan. 2022

When employed as a noun, swagger can mean “an arrogantly self-confident way of walking,” “arrogant or conceitedly self-assured behavior,” or “bold or brash self-confidence.” As a verb it means “to conduct oneself in an arrogant or superciliously pompous manner,” “to brag, boast,” or “to force by argument or threat.” Although Shakespeare has often been credited with coining swagger (it appears in A Midsummer Night’s Dream), the word was in use prior to its appearance in the Bard’s writing.

You that beare the name of souldiers, and live baselie swaggering in everie ale-house, having no other exhibition but from harlots and strumpets; seeke some newe trade, and leave whoring and quarrelling, least besides the nightly guilt of your owne banqurout consciences, Bridewell or Newgate proove the ende of your caveleering.
— Thomas Nashe, The terrors of the night, 1594

’Deadlock’

Deadlock appeared in numerous news stories throughout the past week, amidst reports that the jury in the trial of Elizabeth Holmes, the former head of Theranos, was unable to reach a verdict on several counts.

Jurors say they are deadlocked on three counts in Elizabeth Holmes trial
— (headline) The Washington Post, 3 Jan. 2022

We define deadlock as “a state of inaction or neutralization resulting from the opposition of equally powerful uncompromising persons or factions; standstill.” Deadlock may be quite similar in appearance to deadline, but the words are not formed the same way. Deadlock is uses the sense of dead meaning “complete, absolute,” whereas deadline uses the sense meaning “kill that person when they step over that line.”

’Emmerder’

Emmerder was in the news late in the week, after the French president used the word in an interview.

Emmanuel Macron has courted controversy by telling a French newspaper that his government wants to “piss off” the unvaccinated by banning them from venues such as restaurants and restricting their ability to travel. Speaking to Le Parisien, the French president used the coarse expression “emmerder”, which comes from the word “merde” (meaning s***) and which can also be translated as “to make life difficult”.
— Rory Sullivan, _The Independent_ (London, Eng.), 5 Jan. 2022

We do not define emmerder, as the word is French, and does not yet have wide enough use among English speakers (as is the case with bonjour or esprit de l’escalier) to merit inclusion. While emmerder tends to carry the meaning of piss off in French, it is etymologically connected to the English word immerd, which means “to cover with excrement.”

’Traffic’

It was a busy week for traffic, after a snowstorm caused thousands of motorists to sit immobile in this, some for as long as 24 hours.

Interstate 95 reopened late Tuesday in Virginia after snow and ice brought traffic to a daylong standstill, but questions remained around why winter weather left drivers stranded overnight, especially given advanced forecasts from experts.
— Ryan W. Miller, USA Today, 5 Jan. 2022

Traffic has many meanings in addition to the one that pertains to the thing you sit in on your way to the office (a sense that we define as “congestion of vehicles”). The word came into English in the beginning of the 16th century, initially with the meaning of “the vehicles, pedestrians, ships, or planes moving along a route” (traffic comes in part from the Old Italian trafficare, meaning “to trade in coastal waters”). In addition to these senses the word may carry such meanings as “the volume of customers visiting a business establishment,” “illegal or disreputable usually commercial activity,” or “to visit as a customer.”

’Exemption’

A man who is perhaps not vaccinated, and who wished to travel to a country (with many people who have strong feelings about his vaccination status) in order that he might hit a ball over a net and collect a large sum of money, caused lookups for the word exemption to spike.

Novak Djokovic's chance to play for a 10th Australian Open title was thrown into limbo Thursday when the country denied him entry and canceled his visa because he failed to meet the requirements for an exemption to COVID-19 vaccination rules.
— ESPN, 6 Jan. 2022

We define exemption as either “the act of exempting or state of being exempt" or “one that exempts or is exempted” (when used in this latter sense the word especially refers to “a source or amount of income exempted from taxation”). Exemption (and exempt) comes from the Latin eximere, meaning “to take out,” a root that it shares with both example and eximious (an archaic word meaning “choice, excellent”).

Our Antedating of the Week

Our antedating of the week is ineligible, defined as “not eligible : not qualified to be chosen for an office : not worthy to be chosen or preferred.” Our earliest known use of this word had previously come in 1770, but recent findings show that we’ve been finding people and things ineligible since at least the beginning of the 17th century.

In civill and popular elections, if men take choyce of such a person, to beare any office or place among them; as by the locall Charters, Ordinances, Statutes, or other Customes which should rule them in their choice, is altogether ineligible: the election is de iure nulla, naught and voyde; the incapacitie of the person elected, making a nullity in the act of election.
— Robert Sanderson, Two Sermons, 1622