The Words of the Week - May 2
Dictionary lookups from the courts, Canada, and Amphibia
‘Liberal’
Liberal was much in the news this week following elections in Canada, with a corresponding bump in lookups.
Prime Minister Mark Carney led his Liberal Party to a narrow victory in Canada’s pivotal election on Monday, securing a fourth term in power for the party and a renewed mandate to lead the fight against President Trump over trade and the nation’s sovereignty.
—Matina Stevis-Gridneff and Ian Austen, The New York Times, 29 Apr. 2025
We define the relevant, capitalized sense of the adjective Liberal as “of or constituting a political party advocating or associated with the principles of political liberalism.” Liberalism in this use is defined as “a political philosophy based on belief in progress and stressing the essential goodness of the human race, freedom for the individual from arbitrary authority, and protection and promotion of political and civil liberties,” and refers especially to “such a philosophy calling for the government to play a crucial role in relieving social inequities (such as those involving race, gender, or class) and in protecting the environment, and often including the aims of social liberalism.”
‘Interfere’
The verb interfere was trending on Tuesday.
In April, the Supreme Court directed the Trump administration to “facilitate” the return to the U.S. of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an El Salvador citizen who was deported to his home country. Abrego Garcia had been living in Maryland and had an immigration court order preventing his deportation to his native country over fears he would face persecution from local gangs. So far, Abrego Garcia remains held in a Salvadoran prison. Trump said last week that he won the presidential election on the promise of deportations and that the courts are interfering with his efforts.
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We define the relevant sense of interfere as “to interpose in a way that hinders or impedes; come into collision or be in opposition.”
‘Defiance’
Lookups for defiance were high late in the week.
On Tuesday, Gene L. Dodaro, the comptroller general of the Government Accountability Office, revealed at a congressional hearing that his office had opened “39 different investigations” into the [Trump] administration. He suggested some of the focus was on cuts or changes to spending at the Education Department, the Environmental Protection Agency and other major federal offices. Under a 1970s law, the Government Accountability Office has the power to investigate whether an administration has improperly withheld authorized funding in defiance of Congress. The watchdog has the power to sue if it finds the administration illegally impounds funds.
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We define the relevant sense of defiance as “an act of instance of defying” and the relevant sense of the verb defy as “to confront with assured power of resistance.”
‘Eft’
Lookups for eft spiked uncharacteristically on Tuesday afternoon. It’s not clear why, although ’tis the season for amphibians crossing the nation’s roadways at night (drive carefully!).
All eastern newts begin life as jelly-coated eggs scattered in stagnant or sluggish bodies of water. Larval newts emerge in spring as tiny, drab olive tadpoles with feathery external gills and an appetite for even tinier invertebrates. Over the course of about three months, they grow first forelimbs then hindlimbs, trade their gills for lungs, and develop pebbly skin that’s good at retaining moisture. They also turn a vivid orange-red, with a line of black-ringed dots down their back. This is the red eft stage, which is so distinct from their larval and adult forms that they were once thought to be a different species.
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The word eft refers to a newt (a type of small salamander) and especially to the terrestrial phase of a predominantly aquatic newt. Eft traces back to the Old English efete and has been in use since before the 12th century.
Word Worth Knowing: ‘Magnum’
Magnum is the Latin word meaning “large,” but since it’s used as a noun in English, perhaps “large thing” or “large one” is a better translation. Its connection to wine has to do with having a lot—or perhaps too much—of a good thing. In the early 1700s, magnum bonum (“a large good thing”) was a term used to mean “a large bottle of wine,” and subsequently the bonum dropped off, to make magnum the designation of a large bottle of wine, specifically one that contains 1.5 liters, or the equivalent of two standard bottles, usually of Champagne.
The bottle that is twice the size of a magnum is called a Jeroboam; one twice that size is called a Methuselah. The names of ever-larger bottles include Salmanazar (equivalent to twelve bottles), Balthazar (sixteen bottles), and Nebuchadnezzar (twenty bottles). These words come from the names of biblical kings and patriarchs, and form a kind of hierarchy of size, presumably for large celebrations.
