- Today's Word
Doppelganger
[DOP-uhl-gang-er]
Definition
- (noun) A look-alike or double of a living person, often portrayed as a ghostly or paranormal phenomenon. In modern usage, it can simply refer to someone who closely resembles another person, either in appearance or behavior.
Example
At the party, Sarah was shocked to meet her doppelganger – a woman who looked so much like her that even their friends had trouble telling them apart.
Fun Fact
The term “doppelganger” comes from German, literally meaning “double walker.” It entered popular culture in the 19th century through Gothic literature, where doppelgangers were often portrayed as sinister or uncanny beings. In some traditions, seeing one’s own doppelganger was considered an omen of bad luck or even death. Today, the concept of doppelgangers remains popular in literature, film, and television, often used as a plot device to explore themes of identity and the uncanny. In everyday usage, it’s lost much of its supernatural connotation and is often used playfully to describe people who bear a striking resemblance to each other.
(adjective) Devoid of intelligence, substance, or meaningful content; empty in a way that is made worse by the appearance of fullness.
The panel discussion was so vacuous — four articulate people saying nothing of substance for ninety minutes — that the audience left feeling vaguely cheated by their own attention.
Vacuous derives from the Latin vacuus, meaning “empty” or “void,” rooted in vacare — “to be empty” or “to be free.” The same root gives us vacuum, vacant, vacation — all words built around the idea of emptiness or absence. It entered English in the 17th century, initially used in scientific contexts to describe a literal vacuum before acquiring its cutting figurative sense of a mind or expression that contains nothing worth engaging with.