TỪ VỰNG TOEIC unit 12

Unit 12
UMBR VEST THE/THEO ICON URB CULT DEM/DEMO POPUL Animal
Words
Quiz 12-1 Quiz 12-2 Quiz 12-3 Quiz 12-4 Quiz 12-5 Review Quizzes 12
UMBR comes from the Latin umbra, meaning “shadow.” Thus, the familiar
umbrella, with its ending meaning “little,” casts a “little shadow” to keep off
the sun or the rain.


umber
(1) A darkish brown mineral containing manganese and
iron oxides used for coloring paint. (2) A color that is greenish brown to dark
reddish brown.
• Van Dyke prized umber as a pigment and used it constantly in his oil
paintings.
The mineral deposits of Italy provided sources of a number of natural
pigments, among them umber. Since the late Renaissance, umber has been in
great demand as a coloring agent. When crushed and mixed with paint, it
produces an olive color known as raw umber; when crushed and burnt, it
produces a darker tone known as burnt umber.


adumbrate
(2) To hint at or foretell.

(1) To give a sketchy outline or disclose in part.

• The Secretary of State would only adumbrate his ideas for bringing peace to
Bosnia.
A synonym for adumbrate is foreshadow, which means to present a shadowy
version of something before it becomes reality or is provided in full. Tough

questioning by a Supreme Court justice may adumbrate the way he or she is
planning to rule on a case. A bad review by a critic may adumbrate the failure
of a new film. And rats scurrying off a ship were believed to adumbrate a
coming disaster at sea.


penumbra
(1) The partial shadow surrounding a complete
shadow, as in an eclipse. (2) The fringe or surrounding area where something
exists less fully.
• This area of the investigation was the penumbra where both the FBI and the
CIA wanted to pursue their leads.
Every solar eclipse casts an umbra, the darker central area in which almost no
light reaches the earth, and a penumbra, the area of partial shadow where part
of the sun is still visible. Penumbra can thus be used to describe any “gray
area” where things aren't all black and white. For example, the right to
privacy falls under the penumbra of the U.S. Constitution; though it isn't
specifically guaranteed there, the Supreme Court has held that it is implied,
and thus that the government may not intrude into certain areas of a citizen's
private life. Because its existence is still shadowy, however, the Court is still
determining how much of an individual's life is protected by the right to
privacy.


umbrage
A feeling of resentment at some slight or insult, often
one that is imagined rather than real.
• She often took umbrage at his treatment of her, without being able to
pinpoint what was offensive about it.
An umbrage was originally a shadow, and soon the word also began to mean

“a shadowy suspicion.” Then it came to mean “displeasure” as well—that is,
a kind of shadow blocking the sunlight. Umbrage is now generally used in
the phrase “take umbrage at.” An overly sensitive person may take umbrage
at something as small as having his or her name pronounced wrong.


VEST comes from the Latin verb vestire, “to clothe” or “to dress,” and the
noun vestis, “clothing” or “garment.” Vest is the shortest English word we
have from this root, and is the name of a rather small piece of clothing.


divest
(1) To get rid of or free oneself of property, authority, or
title. (2) To strip of clothing, ornaments, or equipment.
• In protest against apartheid, many universities in the 1980s divested
themselves of all stock in South African companies.
If you decide to enter a monastery, you may divest yourself of most of your
possessions. When a church is officially abandoned, it's usually divested of
its ornaments and furnishings. A company that's going through hard times
may divest itself of several stores, and investors are constantly divesting
themselves of stocks that aren't performing well enough. And when it turns
out that athletes have been using steroids, they're usually divested of any
awards they may have won.


investiture

The formal placing of someone in office.

• At an English monarch's investiture, he or she is presented with the crown,

scepter, and sword, the symbols of power.
In its original meaning, an investiture was the clothing of a new officeholder
in garments that symbolized power. The Middle Ages saw much debate over
the investiture of bishops by kings and emperors. These rulers felt that high
religious offices were theirs to give as rewards for someone's loyal service or
as bribes for someone's future support; the popes, on the other hand, regarded
these investitures as the improper buying and selling of church offices. The
investiture struggle caused tension between popes and monarchs and even led
to wars.


transvestite
A person, especially a male, who wears the
clothing and adopts the mannerisms of the opposite sex.
• In Handel's operas, the heroic male leading roles are today often sung by
female transvestites, since he originally wrote them for the soprano range.
Transvestite includes the prefix trans-, “across,” and thus means literally
“cross-dresser.” In the theater, from ancient Greece to Elizabethan England,
transvestism was common because all parts—even Juliet—were played by
men. Traditional Japanese Kabuki and Noh drama still employ transvestism
of this sort. In everyday life, it's now so acceptable for women to wear men's
clothing that the word transvestite is generally applied only to men. The
much newer word transgender describes people who think of themselves as
having changed sex, or who simply don't believe in the idea that they're either
one sex or the other.


travesty
(1) An inferior or distorted imitation. (2) A broadly
comic imitation in drama, literature, or art that is usually grotesque and

ridiculous.
• The senator was shouting that the new tax bill represented a travesty of tax
reform.
The word travesty comes from the same prefix and root as transvestite. Since
cross-dressing often isn't very convincing, the word has usually referred to
something absurd. So a verdict that angers people may be denounced as a
“travesty of justice.” Saturday Night Live specializes in dramatic travesties
mocking everything from political figures and issues to popular culture
—“disguised” versions intended for entertainment. Travesty may also be a
verb; thus, Mel Brooks has travestied movie genres of all kinds—westerns,
thrillers, and silent films, among others.


Quiz 12-1
A. Fill in the blank with the correct letter:
a. penumbra
b. transvestite
c. investiture
d. travesty
e. divest
f. umber
g. umbrage
h. adumbrate
1. All the pigments—crimson, russet, ___, cobalt blue, and the rest—were
mixed by his assistants.
2. The ___ of the prime minister was an occasion of pomp and ceremony.
3. Some people are quick to take ___ the moment they think someone might
have been disrespectful.
4. Since all the judges were cronies of the dictator, the court proceedings
were a ___ of justice.

5. The new director planned to ___ the museum of two of its Picassos.
6. The farther away a source of light is from the object casting a shadow, the
wider will be that shadow's ___.
7. The young model became a notorious success when she was discovered to
be a ___.
8. The increasing cloudiness and the damp wind seemed to ___ a stormy
night.
Answers


B. Match the definition on the left to the correct word on the right:
1. resentment
a. penumbra
2. brownish color
b. travesty
3. installing in office c. transvestite
4. cross-dresser
d. adumbrate
5. bad imitation
e. divest
6. get rid of
f. umbrage
7. near shadow
g. investiture
8. partially disclose h. umber
Answers


THE/THEO comes from the Greek word meaning “god.” Theology, the
study of religion, is practiced by theologians. Monotheism is the worship of a

single god; Christianity, Islam, and Judaism are monotheistic religions, and
all three worship the same god. Polytheistic religions such as those of ancient
Greece and Rome, on the other hand, worship many gods.


apotheosis
perfect example.

(1) Transformation into a god. (2) The

• Abraham Lincoln's apotheosis after his assassination transformed the
controversial politician into the saintly savior of his country.
In ancient Greece, historical figures were sometimes worshipped as gods. In
Rome, apotheosis was rare until the emperor Augustus declared the dead
Julius Caesar to be a god, and soon other dead emperors were being
apotheosized as well. In older paintings you may see a heroic figure—
Napoleon, George Washington, or Shakespeare, for example—being raised
into the clouds, symbolizing his or her apotheosis. But today any great classic
example of something can be called its apotheosis. You might hear it said, for
example, that Baroque music reached its apotheosis in the works of J. S.
Bach, or that the Duesenberg Phaeton was the apotheosis of the touring car.


atheistic

Denying the existence of God or divine power.

• The atheistic Madalyn Murray O'Hair successfully sought the removal of
prayer from American public schools in the 1960s.
In the Roman Empire, early Christians were called atheistic because they

denied the existence of the Roman gods. And once the Christian church was
firmly established, it condemned the Romans as atheists because they didn't
believe in the Christian God. In later centuries, English-speaking Christians
would often use the words pagan and heathen to describe such nonChristians, while atheist would be reserved for those who actually denied the
existence of any god. Atheism is different from agnosticism, which claims
that the existence of any higher power is unknowable; and lots of people who
simply don't think much about religion often call themselves agnostics as
well.


pantheon
(1) A building serving as the burial place of or
containing memorials to the famous dead of a nation. (2) A group of notable
persons or things.
• A Hall of Fame serves as a kind of pantheon for its field, and those admitted
in the early years are often the greatest of all.
Each of the important Roman gods and goddesses had many temples erected
in their name. But in 27 B.C. a temple to all the gods together was completed
in Rome; twice destroyed, it was ultimately replaced by a third temple around
A.D. 126. This extraordinary domed structure is still one of the important
sights of Rome, and the burial place for the painters Raphael and Carracci
and two kings. In Paris, a great church was completed in 1789–90; named the
Panthéon, it was announced as the future resting place of France's great
figures, and the bodies of Victor Hugo, Louis Pasteur, Marie Curie, and many
others now rest within its walls.


theocracy
(1) Government by officials who are regarded as
divinely inspired. (2) A state governed by a theocracy.

• The ancient Aztecs lived in a theocracy in which guidance came directly
from the gods through the priests.
In the Middle Ages, the Muslim empires stretching around much of the
Mediterranean were theocracies, and the pope ruled most of modern-day
Italy. But theocracies are rare today. Modern Iran and Saudi Arabia (and
perhaps half a dozen others) are usually regarded as theocratic governments,
since, even though Iran's president is elected by popular vote and Saudi
Arabia is ruled by a royal family, the countries' laws are religious laws. But
when a government tries to follow all the teachings of a single religion,
things usually don't work out terribly well, so U.S. Constitution and Bill of
Rights forbid using religion as the principal basis for democracy.


ICON comes from the Greek eikon, which led to the Latin icon, both
meaning “image.” Though the icon- root hasn't produced many English
words, the words that is does appear in tend to be interesting.


icon
(1) A religious image usually painted on a small wooden panel:
idol. (2) Emblem, symbol.
• Henry Ford's assembly line captured the imagination of the world, and he
and his company became icons of industrial capitalism.
In the Eastern Orthodox church, much importance is given to icons, usually
small portraits on wood—sometimes with gold-leaf paint—of Jesus, Mary, or
a saint, which hang in churches and in the houses of the faithful. The
Orthodox church favors icons partly because they communicate directly and
forcefully even to uneducated people. They are regarded as sacred; some
believers actually pray to them, and many believe that icons have carried out
miracles. The common modern uses of icon grew out of this original sense.

The fact that Orthodox icons have a symbolic role led to icon being used to
mean simply “symbol.” Because of the icon's sacredness, the term also came
to mean “idol.” And once we began to use idol to refer to pop-culture stars, it
wasn't long before we began using icon the same way. But for the little
computer-desktop images that you click on, the older meaning of “symbol” is
the one we're thinking of.


iconic
(1) Symbolic. (2) Relating to a greatly admired and
successful person or thing.
• The 1963 March on Washington was the iconic event in the history of the
civil-rights movement, now familiar to all American schoolchildren.
The original meaning of iconic was essentially “resembling an icon,” but
today it more often seems to mean “so admired that it could be the subject of
an icon.” And with that meaning, iconic has become part of the language of
advertising and publicity; today companies and magazines and TV hosts are
constantly encouraging us to think of some consumer item or pop star or
show as first-rate or immortal or flawless—absolutely “iconic”—when he or
she or it is actually nothing of the kind.


iconoclast
(1) A person who destroys religious images or
opposes their use. (2) A person who attacks settled beliefs or institutions.
• She's always rattling her friends by saying outrageous things, and she
enjoys her reputation as an iconoclast.
When the early books of the Bible were being written, most of the other
Middle Eastern religions had more than one god; these religions generally
encouraged the worship of idols of the various gods, which were often

regarded as magical objects. But in the Ten Commandments given to Moses
in the Old Testament, God prohibits the making of “graven images” or
“idols” for worship, proclaiming that the Jews are to worship only one God,
who is too great to be represented in an idol. However, by the 6th century
A.D., Christians had begun to create religious images in order to focus the
prayers of the faithful. Opposition to icons led to the Iconoclastic
Controversy in A.D. 726, when, supported by the pope, iconoclasts began
smashing and burning the images in churches and monasteries (clast- comes
from the Greek word meaning “to break”). In time, peace was restored, and
almost all Christians have since accepted depictions of Jesus, Mary, and the
saints. Today an iconoclast is someone who constantly argues with
conventional thinking, refusing to “worship” the objects of everyone else's
“faith.”


iconography
(1) The imagery and symbolism of a work
of art or an artist. (2) The study of artistic symbolism.
• Today scholars pore over the advertisements in glossy magazines, studying
the iconography for clues to the ads' hidden meanings.
If you saw a 17th-century painting of a man writing at a desk with a lion at
his feet, would you know you were looking at St. Jerome, translator of the
Bible, who, according to legend, once pulled a thorn from the paw of a lion,
which thereafter became his devoted friend? And if a painting showed a
young woman reclining on a bed with a shower of gold descending on her,
would you recognize her as Danaë, locked up in a tower to keep her away
from the lustful Zeus, who then managed to gain access to her by
transforming himself into golden light (or golden coins)? An iconographic
approach to art can make museum-going a lot of fun—and amateur
iconographers know there are also plenty of symbols lurking in the images

that advertisers bombard us with daily.


Quiz 12-2
A. Fill in each blank with the correct letter:
a. pantheon
b. iconic
c. atheistic
d. iconography
e. icon
f. apotheosis
g. iconoclast
h. theocracy
1. Her personal ___ of actresses included Vanessa Redgrave, Helen Mirren,
Emma Thompson, and Maggie Smith.
2. He enjoyed being an ___, since he had a lot of odd ideas and arguing
suited his personality well.
3. His well-known ___ beliefs meant that he couldn't hope for great success
in politics.
4. Thirty years later, his great speech was viewed as an ___ moment in
modern American history.
5. Being inducted into the Hall of Fame is as close as a modern ballplayer can
come to ___.
6. The strange ___ of the painting had caught her attention years ago, and she
continued to puzzle over the obviously symbolic appearance of various odd
objects.
7. They had come back from Russia with a beautiful ___ of Mary and another
of St. Basil.
8. The high priest in this medieval ___ was equivalent to a dictator.
Answers

B. Match the word on the left to its definition on the right:
1. icon
a. state ruled by religion
2. pantheon
b. symbolic
3. apotheosis c. symbol
4. iconography d. nonbelieving
5. atheistic
e. artistic symbolism
6. iconoclast f. hall of fame
7. theocracy g. dissenter
8. iconic
h. perfect example
Answers


URB comes from the Latin noun for “city.” Our word urban describes cities
and the people who live in them. With its sub- prefix (see SUB), a suburb is a
town “near” or “under” a larger city, and suburban houses are home to
suburbanites.