The Words of the Week - 09/10/21

’Breathless’

Breathless appeared in countless obituaries and headlines last week, after the death of Jean-Paul Belmondo, the French actor who first came to fame as the star of a movie of this name.

Jean-Paul Belmondo, star of Breathless, dies aged 88 https://t.co/8jl9FB3rKM

— The Guardian (@guardian) September 6, 2021

Breathless was the English translation of the film, a famous exemplar of French New Wave cinema. In French the title was À bout de souffle ("at end of breath”), which matches the “panting or gasping for breath” sense of breathless (the word can also mean “not breathing,” “dead,” “gripped with emotion,” or “oppressive because of no fresh air or breeze”).

’Resurrection’

In other cinematic news, the preview for the sequel to the Matrix trilogy spiked considerable interest in the word resurrection.

Shifting release dates cast some doubt over whether the film is actually coming out this year, but the first full-length trailer is finally here. And it suggests that The Matrix Resurrections will live up to the original trilogy’s legacy of entertaining and challenging science fiction.
— Richard Newby, Vulture, 9 Sept. 2021

Resurrection often appears in reference in a religious sense, with the meaning “the rising of Christ from the dead” (this use is capitalized). It also may be used to mean “the rising again to life of all the human dead before the final judgment” (a use which is often capitalized) and also “the state of one risen from the dead” or “resurgence, revival” (these senses are not typically capitalized). The word may be traced to the Latin resurgere, “to rise from the dead.”

’Ransomware’

Ransomware was in the news for the same reasons that it usually is: computer hackers confounded an organization by infecting their computers with a virus and demanded money to make the resultant problems go away.

Howard University, one of the country’s leading historically Black colleges and universities, canceled some classes for a second day after it was hit with a ransomware attack.
— Madeleine Ngo, The New York Times, 7 Sept. 2021

We define ransomware as “malware that requires the victim to pay a ransom to access encrypted files,” and malware, for those lucky enough to have never encountered this sort of thing, as “software designed to interfere with a computer's normal functioning.” The latter portion of these words, ware, is formed after software, which was formed on hardware, which initially had the meaning of "ware (such as fittings, cutlery, tools, utensils, or parts of machines) made of metal."

’Stringent’

Stringent found itself in high demand by journalists all of a sudden, after President Biden announced new rules of this variety for testing and vaccination.

On Thursday, President Joe Biden announced the most stringent vaccine requirements yet in an effort to combat the spread of the deadly COVID-19 variant that's driving up new cases once again.
— Laura L. Davis, USA Today, 9 Sept.

We define stringent as “marked by rigor, strictness, or severity especially with regard to rule or standard.” However, stringent, which comes from the Latin verb stringere (“to bind tight”) can also mean “tight, constricted” or “marked by money scarcity and credit strictness.”

’Champagne’

Champagne spiked in lookups after reports that authorities in Russia were insisting that sparkling white wine sold in Russia with this designation would be required to have come from Russia.

France And Russia Are In A Tussle Over Who Gets To Call Champagne ... ‘Champagne’
— (headline) NPR, 3 Sept. 2021

Many oenophiles hold that in order for a wine to properly be referred to as Champagne it must be made that region of France (our first definition is “a white sparkling wine made in the old province of Champagne, France”). However, we also allow that the word may carry the meaning of “a similar wine made elsewhere,” as it is widely used in this sense. Champagne may also refer to non-potable things, such as a color, a pale orange yellow to light grayish-yellowish brown.

Our Antedating of the Week

Our antedating of the week is compliance, defined as “the act or process of complying to a desire, demand, proposal, or regimen or to coercion.” Our earliest known date of use had previously come in 1630, but recent findings show that we’ve been in compliance with one thing or another since at least 1600.

Somewhat before this the English Plantations in Virginia, and the Caribdy Island, revolted from their obedience to the Parliament, and declare unanimously for Monarchy and Liturgy, but the decay of their Trade (without which they could not long subsist) and a Squadron of Ships sent under the Command of Sir George Askew, quickly reduces them to complyance.
—An exact history of the several changes of government in England, from the horrid murther of King Charles I to the happy restauration of King Charles II, 1600