Learned Words

The term "learned" includes several heterogeneous subdivisions of words. We find here numerous words that are used in scientific prose and can be identified by their dry, matter-of-fact flavour (e.g., com­prise, compile, experimental, heterogeneous, homogeneous, conclusive, divergent, etc.).

To this group also belongs the so-called "officialese". These are words of the official, bureaucratic language: assist (for help), endeavour (for try), proceed (for go on), approximately (for about), sufficient (for enough), attired (for dressed), inquire (for ask).

The words, which may be called "literary", also have a particular flavour of their own, usually described as "refined". They are mostly polysyllabic words drawn from the Romance languages and, though fully adapted to the English phonetic system, some of them continue to sound singularly foreign. Here are some exam­ples: solitude, sentiment, fascination, fastidiousness, delusion, medita­tion, felicity, elusive, cordial, illusionary.