Meretricious is a word that is usable and it describes something that most of us have encountered in day to day life. This makes ‘meretricious’ a good word to add to our vocabularies.
The word is an adjective and is pronounced “mare-eh-TRISH-us” and the definition of the word is offensive insincerity, flashy or vulgar attention, or based on deception. Many of the so-called “pick up lines” that some men use on women are meretricious. So are some comments made on the streets when a pretty girl walks by.
This word has a Latin origin. The Latin word is meretricius and it means ‘pertaining to prostitutes or harlots’. It has also been in use since the 1620’s, so it is definitely not a modern term. The modern term usage simply isn’t gender-specific. The word is most commonly used today in relation to its offensive insincerity meaning.
There are enough examples of meretricious behavior in current times that this could be a valuable word to add to your vocabulary.
I do think that we need to learn vocabularies. It would be easy to express oneself.
I totally agree with that. There is tremendous value in the words we use, but only when we understand the meaning.
For me, I always believed that it will be improved if we practice them in making our own sentences. As they said, “Practice is the best teacher.”
That is very true and it is true of any language or anything else that we are trying to learn.
I hope people will do appreciate to learn the differences between different languages. That’s what I felt when learning five languages and dialects.