ob-STREP-er-uhs
The obstreperous child disrupted the entire classroom with his outbursts.
Fun Fact
From Latin ob (“against”) and strepere (“to make a noise”), obstreperous behavior isn’t just loud—it’s defiantly loud. Think protestors clashing with police, or characters in sitcoms who constantly shout over one another. It’s not just chaos—it’s resistant chaos.
bih-LY
(verb) To give a false impression of something; to contradict or fail to reflect the true nature of something.
Her calm expression belied the anxiety she felt as she waited for the verdict.
From Old English beleogan, meaning “to deceive by lying,” from be- (an intensifying prefix) + leogan (“to lie, tell falsehoods”). Over time the sense softened — “belie” no longer implies deliberate deception but simply a discrepancy between appearance and reality. It has been used in its modern sense since at least the 13th century.
Fun Fact
“Belie” is a word that grammatical purists quietly argue about. Its two accepted meanings are nearly opposite — it can mean “to give a false impression of something” or “to show something to be false.” So “her youth belied her experience” could mean either “her youth made her experience seem less than it was” or “her youth contradicted what experience would suggest.” This internal contradiction has led some usage guides to recommend avoiding the word entirely — which is quietly ironic, given that a word about misrepresentation has ended up misrepresenting itself.
Today's Word Recidivism rih-SID-ih-viz-um Definition (noun) The tendency to relapse...
Read More