You all know these words we recently heard, were fascinated by and try to put to use as often as possible. We know how to pronounce them, we know how to spell them and we know approximately nothing about what they really mean. Occasionally this proves fatal, when the victim of our superior conversation technique toss the word smugly and knowingly back at us. I am compiling a list of these words and their meaning here. Here are three of them:
Charlatan
The word charlatan paints the picture of someone who make elaborate claims to be someone or something he is not, in terms of skills, knowledge or abilities. Words to the same meaning include fraud and quack. Charlatan is most likely derived from Italian, ciarlatan or cerretano – which is a person from Cerreto, an Italian city with the dubious honour of once having been famous for its multitude of quacks.
Pretentious
For someone to safely be accused of being pretensious he or she should either a) have made claims of some major acchievement that he or she allegedly have not had any part in whatsoever or b) have made an extravagant outward show of some kind in order to put himself in a fortunate position.
Querulant
Allthough often used about people who are fond of prolonging discussions by giving out an endless stream of useless questions a querulant is just someone who likely to throw out accusations and raise suspicion without no immediate proof of him or her taking any pleasure in it.
