AF: Week One Vocab -- Box 3 -- Words in Context

Week One Vocab:  idosyncrasy, ubiquitous, ethereal, vapid, dalliance, aphorism, eschew, milieu

Here's where and how they were used:

idiosyncrasy-->idiosyncratic
What the Net diminishes is Johnson's primary kind of knowledge: the ability to know, in depth, a subject for ourselves, to construct within our own minds the rich and idiosyncratic set of connections that give rise to a singular intelligence (Carr, 143/260).

...the action became known as the Million Hoodie March.  It was a catchy and potent meme, one that neatly highlighted the racial double standards in clothing: hoodies are ubiquitous, yet young black men who wear them are regarded as suspicious by police (Thompson, 265/341).

Attention may seem ethereal — a "ghost inside the head," as the developmental psychologist Bruce McCandliss says — but it's a genuine physical state... (Carr, 189/260).

...the status update world...is a parade of narcissism — vapid, inward looking, and idiotic (Thompson, 220/341).

...I did manage to teach myself to use the system's cumbersome word-processing program and even learned a few BASIC commands.  That was just a digital dalliance.  For every hour I passed in [digital worlds], I must have spent two dozen next door [in the library] (Carr, 123/260).

For a commencement address, he dimly recalled a terrific aphorism that he'd pinned to a card above his desk..."Start many fires" (Thompson, 31/341).

Now that the context of reading is again shifting, from the private page to the communal screen, authors will adapt once more. They will...tailor their work to a milieu that...Caleb Crain describes as "groupiness," where people read mainly "for the sake of a feeling of belonging" rather than for personal enlightenment or amusement.  As social concerns override literary ones, writers seem fated to eschew virtuosity and experimentation in favor of a bland but immediately accessible style.  Writing will become a means for recording chatter (Carr, 112/260).


Here is Week Two Vocab, for anyone who wants to get a jump on it.  I would appreciate help in finding these words in the text.  Can anyone help me?  If you contributed the word, look in your notebook and see if you noted how and where the word was used in our readings.  In a pinch, come in at lunch, and I'll put you to work on my iPad, searching for the words in the digital versions.  It's easy, but time consuming.

The words:  cacophony, tautology, compendium, appendages, nihilism, ad hominem, tutelage, piddling.