Category: words, words, words

Patois (noun): "Regional dialect or provincial speech. Jargon."

Seen: In a Salon article about gender and the recession. 

Ingot (noun): A mass of metal in convenient shipping size.

Heard: On the most recent episode of Radiolab.

Enervate (verb): "To deprive of force or strength, to weaken."

Usage: "Will the honeymoon around Obama's inauguration enervate the angry spirits of conversative talk radio? Somehow I doubt it."

Seen: In a recent New York magazine article about loneliness.

Lacuna (noun): "Missing part, gap."

Source: X Saves the World, which I’m reading as research for my next book project.

Victuals (noun): Food supplies, provisions.

Usage: "My trip to the Farmer’s Market this morning resulted in a 3/4 full bag of victuals, some of which made it home without bites in their hides."

Found: Within a fabulous article on mobility and urban architecture in The Economist. Is looking to be of great help for my next book project too.

Atelier (noun): "A workshop or studio of an artist or craftsperson."

Uses:

• A knitting shop in San Francisco where my friend Erin worked.

• A very nice restaurant in New York that no longer exists.

Heard: on the "Reconsidering Crafts" episode of To the Best of Our Knowledge.

Regnant (adj.): Ruling, predominant, widespreed

Seen: In a New Yorker article by Henry Louis Gates Jr. (an intellectual hero and role model of mine) about Professor Gates’s grandfather’s extensive scrapbooks and the hidden history of his family they revealed.

Provident (adjective): "Having foresight. Planning carefully for the future."

Seen: In Ann Patchett’s Truth and Beauty, currently my bedside book.

Foal (verb, colloquially): "To give birth."

(as seen in Beloved, which I’m reading right now)

Catenary (adjective): "Of or pertaining to a chain or linked series."

Seen: On page 28 of  The Writing Life by Annie Dillard, which I’m read some of last night.