Dear Readers:
When Dr. Ink learns an interesting new word, he likes to pass it on. Today that word is ‘bloviate,’ and it means ‘to orate verbosely and windily,’ according to Webster’s Third New International. The word does not appear in Doc’s OED or in his American Heritage Dictionary.
Two great Southern journalists, Hodding Carter III and Chris Waddle, like the word, probably because they’ve heard many a Dixie windbag bloviate in their day. (Doc just noticed a squiggly red line under bloviate, which means it is not recognized by the little word expert who lives in his computer.)
A good source on this, and other, unusual words is a website titled World Wide Words, run by Michael Quinion. He defines ‘bloviate’ as ‘to speak pompously.’
“It’s most closely associated with U.S. President Warren Gamaliel Harding,” writes Quinion, “who used it a lot and who was by all accounts the classic example of somebody who orates verbosely and windily.” He suggests a simple etymology, the word ‘blow’ as in ‘blowhard,’ with a mock-Latin ending.
He traces the word to the first half of the nineteenth century, a time when making up newfangled words, sometimes for humorous effect, was in fashion. Chris Waddle advises Doc to think of the word as onomatopoetic, sounding like the action it describes.
And that’s Dr. Ink’s bloviation for the day.
