Into the Wild Vocabulary: English 11

On Mondays you will be assigned the words for the week. We will start with 8 words and work our

way up from there. Each day in class we will discuss two of the words and the meaning. You

should write down the meaning on your own paper to memorize for the quiz on Friday.

These vocabulary words were found on the Share Point Website by: Jan and Carey Cook, posted by

Lindsay Hunter

Example Vocabulary Log:

WORD:

DEFINITION:

EXAMPLE SENTENCE:

YOUR OWN SENTENCE:

Week # 1: Vocabulary WordsDecomposed

Elite

Transcendent

Convoluted

Allure

Adversity

Congenial

Dissuade

VocabularyWORD # 1: Decomposed Verb

DEFINITION: to separate into constituent parts or elements or into simpler compounds

EX. SENT: AN: “Four months later his decomposed body was found…”

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Elite Noun

DEFINITION: the best of a class

EX. SENT.: AN: “Where he’d excelled academically and been an elite athlete.”

YOUR SENT.:

VocabularyWORD # 1: Transcendent Adjective

DEFINITION: extending or lying beyond the limits of ordinary experience

EX. SENT.: AN: “Wandering across North America in search of raw, transcendent experience.”

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Convoluted Adjective

DEFINITION: a complication or intricacy of form, design, or structure

EX. SENT: AN: “I spent more than a year retracing the convoluted path that led to his death in the Alaska taiga”

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary:WORD # 1: Allure Verb

DEFINITION: to entice by charm or attraction

EX. SENT.: AN: “The allure high-risk activities hold for young men of a certain mind.”

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Adversity Noun

DEFINITION: a state, condition, or instance of serious or continued difficulty

EX. SENT: AN: “Peril, adversity, and Tolstoyan renunciation were precisely what he was seeking.”

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary:WORD # 1: Congenial Adjective

DEFINITION: having the same nature, disposition, or tastes

EX. SENT.: CH1: “He was congenial and seemed well educated” (5).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Dissuade Verb

DEFINITION: To convince someone not to do something

EX. SENT: CH1: “Gallien thought the hitchhiker’s scheme was foolhardy and tried repeatedly to dissuade him” (5).

YOUR SENT:

Week # 2 Vocabulary Words

Escarpment

Amalgam

Oxidized

Anomaly

Cursory

Posit

Vocabulary 9/17/07WORD # 1: Escarpment Noun

DEFINITION: A long cliff or steep slope

EX. SENT.: Ch. 2 “Between the flinty crests of the two outermost escarpments of the Outer Range runs an east-west trough…”

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Amalgam Noun

DEFINITION: A mixture of different elements.

EX. SENT: Ch. 2 “carpeted in a boggy amalgam of muskeg, alder thickets, and veins of scrawny spruce.

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 9/18/07WORD # 1: Oxidized Verb

DEFINITION: To combine with oxygen

EX. SENT.: Ch. 2 “The green and white paint is badly oxidized” (10).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Anomaly Noun

DEFINITION: Deviation from the common rule; different

EX. SENT: Ch. 2 “A local secret that’s jealously guarded by those moose hunters and trappers who are aware of the anomaly” (11).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 9/19/07WORD # 1: Cursory Adjective

DEFINITION: Rapidly and superficially produced

EX. SENT.: Ch. 2 “The troopers made a cursory examination of the vehicle” (13).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Posit Verb

DEFINITION: To assume the existence of.

EX. SENT: Ch. 2 “Starvation was posited as the most probable cause of death” (14)

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary Week # 3

Mawkish

Convivial

Severance

Egress

Flout

Intermittent

Austerity

Indolently

Vocabulary 9/22/08WORD # 1: Mawkish Adjective

DEFINITION: Sickly Sentimental; an unpleasant taste.

EX. SENT.: Ch. 3 “Mawkish paintings of game birds taking flight” (16).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Convivial Adjective

DEFINITION: Fond of feasting, drinking, and good company

EX. SENT: Ch. 3 “The living arrangements were loose and convivial” (18).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 9/23/08WORD # 1: Severance Noun

DEFINITION: To keep apart; separate

EX. SENT.: Ch. 3 “To symbolize the complete severance from his previous life” (23).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Egress Noun

DEFINITION: Going or coming; an exit

EX. SENT: Ch. 4 “There was nowhere to move the car…the only route of egress was now a foaming, full-blown river.”

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 9/26/07WORD # 1: Flout Verb

DEFINITION: To indulge in scornful behavior

EX. SENT.: Ch. 4 “and thus considered it his moral responsibility to flout the laws of the state.”

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Intermittent Adjective

DEFINITION: Not continual; occasional

EX. SENT: Ch. 4 “Savoring the intermittent company of other vagabonds he met along the way.”

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 9/27/07WORD # 1: Austerity Noun

DEFINITION: Stern and cold

EX. SENT.: Ch. 4 “McCandless was stirred by the austerity of this landscape.”

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Indolently Adjective

DEFINITION: Little or no activity or movement

EX. SENT: Ch. 4 “The lower Colorado bubbles indolently from reservoir to reservoir.”

YOUR SENT:

Vocab Week # 4

Oxymoron

Itinerant

Primordial

Anachronistic

Creosote

Unabated

Prodigious

Vagabond

Vocabulary 9/27/07WORD # 1: Oxymoron Noun

DEFINITION: Something that is contradictory (pretty ugly, alone together, same difference)

EX. SENT.: Ch. 4 “Bullhead city is a community in the oxymoronic, late-twentieth-century idiom” (39).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Itinerant Adjective

DEFINITION: Traveling from place to place

EX. SENT: Ch. 4 “The seasonal capital of a teeming itinerant society” (43).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/2/07WORD # 1: Primordial Adjective

DEFINITION: First created or developed

EX. SENT.: Ch. 4 “His glorification of the primordial world” (44).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Anachronistic Noun

DEFINITION: Chronologically out of place

EX. SENT: Ch. 5 “Penned in shaky, anachronistic script” (47).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/3/07WORD # 1: Creosote Noun

DEFINITION: A liquid made from tar

EX. SENT.: Ch. 5 “Set up camp in a brake of creosote at the edge of Anza-Borrego” (48).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Unabated Adjective

DEFINITION: To become more intense

EX. SENT: Ch. 5 “Series of major floods…began to rush unabated into the Imperial Valley Canal” (49).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/4/07WORD # 1: Prodigious Adjective

DEFINITION: Exciting amazement or wonder

EX. SENT.: Ch. 5 “Virtually all of the river’s prodigious flow into the Salton sink” (49).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Vagabond Adjective

DEFINITION: Moving from place to place without a home; wanderer

EX. SENT: Ch. 4 “Drifters and sundry vagabonds congregate in this other-worldly setting” (43).

YOUR SENT:

Week of October 15-19Fulminate

Relent

Brash

Ascetic

Lament

Demise

Strident

Ephemeral

Vocabulary 10/16/07WORD # 1: Fulminate (verb)

DEFINITION: To utter or send out with denunciation (pronounce publicly)

EX. SENT.: Ch. 6 “He’d fulminate about his parents or politicians” (52).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Relent (verb)

DEFINITION: To go back, give up

EX. SENT: Ch. 6 “McCandless relented. He struck his camp…and then rode with the old man across the mountains to the coast” (53).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/16/07WORD # 1: Brash (adjective)

DEFINITION: Heedless of consequences

EX. SENT.: Ch. 6 “Astoundingly, the 81 yr old man took the brash 24 yr olds advide to heart” (58).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Ascetic (adjective)

DEFINITION: Practicing strict self-denial

EX. SENT: Ch. 7 “the nobleman-turned-ascetic denounces “the demands of the flesh” (65)

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/17/07WORD # 1: Lament (verb)

DEFINITION: To express sorrow, mourning, or regret

EX. SENT.: Ch. 7 “Once Alex made his mind up about something, there was no changing it” Westerberg laments (67).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Demise (verb)

DEFINITION: To die, decease

EX. SENT: Ch. 8 “Circumstances of his demise were reported in the news media” (70).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/18/07WORD # 1: Strident (adjective)

DEFINITION: Characterized by harsh, insistent sound

EX. SENT.: Ch. 8 “The most strident criticism came in the form of a dense, multi-page epistle” (71).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Ephemeral (adjective)

DEFINITION: Lasting a very short time

EX. SENT: Ch. 9 “The ephemeral bloom of a sego lily peeks from the toe of a ninety-foot stone arch” (88)

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary Quiz1. When you go back, or give up you _______.2. Other than say that someone died, you can say it

led to their ________.3. When something lasts a very short time it is

__________.4. Chris would ______ when he presented publicly

his hatred for politicians.5. Harsh criticism can be ________________.6. After Chris was found dead, it caused many

people to _____________.7. Practicing strict self-denial is to be _______.8. When someone does not care about

consequences they are _____________.

Vocabulary Quiz Key1. When you go back, or give up you Relent.2. Other than say that someone died, you can say it

led to their demise.3. When something lasts a very short time it is

ephemeral.4. Chris would fulminate when he presented publicly

his hatred for politicians.5. Harsh criticism can be strident.6. After Chris was found dead, it caused many

people to lament.7. Practicing strict self-denial is to be ascetic.8. When someone does not care about

consequences they are brash.

Vocabulary Week of 10/29-11/2

Brazen

Eminent

Insolence

Droves

Flora

Fauna

Arcane

Mercurial

Vocabulary 10/29/07WORD # 1: Brazen (adjective)

DEFINITION: Marked by boldness

EX. SENT.: Ch. 9 “…he brazenly knocked on the door of Edward Weston” (89).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Eminent (adjective)

DEFINITION: Standing above others in some quality

EX. SENT: Ch. 9 “Over the next two months the eminent photographer encouraged the boy’s uneven but promising efforts at painting” (90).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/30/07WORD # 1: Insolence (noun)

DEFINITION: Insultingly contemptuous in speech or conduct

EX. SENT.: Ch. 9 “A moral upbringing and a reputation for insolence” (95).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Droves (noun)

DEFINITION: A large number

EX. SENT: Ch. 9 “The papar risked their lives-and lost them in untold droves” (97).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/31/07WORD # 1: Flora (noun)

DEFINITION: A list of plants

EX. SENT.: Ch. 10 “Many of the entries in the brief, perplexing diary recovered with the body were terse observations of flora and fauna” (99).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Fauna (noun)

DEFINITION: Animals characterized by region, time period, or environment

EX. SENT: Same as above

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 11/1/07WORD # 1: Arcane (adjective)

DEFINITION: Secret, mysterious

EX. SENT.: Ch. 11 “Within the ranks of his arcane field-an advanced technology called synthetic aperture radar…” (104)

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Mercurial (adjective)

DEFINITION: Rapid changing of moods

EX. SENT: Ch. 11 “According to members of the extended family, his moods can be dark and mercurial” (105)

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary Quiz: 11/2/07• Section # 1: Multiple Choice

1. Mercurial

a. a type of metal

b. They type of mercury found in rocks

c. Rapidly changing of moods

2. Brazen

a. A bright sunset

b. Marked by boldness

c. Strong

Vocabulary Week of 11/26-11/30

Chastened

Convergence

Bereavement

Demarcate

Precipitous

Desideratum

Vocabulary 11/26/07WORD # 1: Chastened

DEFINITION: To correct by punishment of suffering

EX. SENT.: Ch. 11 “His son’s disappearance scared and chastened him” (105)

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Convergence

DEFINITION: The act of moving toward conformity

EX. SENT: Ch. 11 “It is impossible to know what murky convergence… parent-child dynamics, and alignment of cosmos was responsible” (106)

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/27/07WORD # 1: Bereavement

DEFINITION: Suffering the death of a loved one

EX. SENT.: Ch. 13 “Such bereavement, witnessed at close range, makes even the most eloquent apologia for high-risk activities ring fatuous and hallow”

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Demarcate

DEFINITION: To set apart

EX. SENT: Ch. 14 “The Devils Thumb demarcates the Alaska-British Columbia border” (136).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/28/07WORD # 1: Precipitous

DEFINITION: Very steep

EX. SENT.: Ch. 14 “Slopes rose precipitously from the water’s edge, bearded in a gloom of hemlock and cedar” (136).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Desideratum

DEFINITION: Something desired as essential

EX. SENT: Ch. 14 “Those mountains heralded the approach of my desideratum” (137).

YOUR SENT:

Vocabulary 10/25/07WORD # 1: Labyrinthine

DEFINITION: Resembling something perplex or intricate

EX. SENT.: Ch. 14 “Vast and labyrinthine, the ice cap rides the spine of the Boundary Ranges” (137).

YOUR SENT.:

WORD # 2: Phantasmagoric

DEFINITION: Optical effects and illusions

EX. SENT:

YOUR SENT: