Name: 5 nouns to make you sound smart
Uploaded: 2015-04-09T23:23:08.000Z
Duration: 6 min 27 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Hey, guys. I'm Alex. Thanks for clicking, and welcome to this advanced vocabulary lesson

on five nouns to sound smart. In this lesson, we will look at five words that are a little

bit more formal and you can use whether you're giving a lecture, if you're doing any type

of formal writing, if you're writing an essay, if you're giving a speech in front of a crowd

of people, and you can also use it in everyday dinner conversations if you want your friends

to think that: "Hmm, this guy is using some really high-level vocabulary", or: "this girl".

Let's start with the word: "bedlam". So the sentence here says:

"The streets were in bedlam during the protests." "Protest" is a word some of you Spanish speakers,

Portuguese speakers, you might use the word: "manifestations". In English, we say: "protests".

All right? So: "The streets were in bedlam during the protests." So if you imagine a

protest happening with a lot of people, you're probably imaging lots of chaos if it's not

a peaceful protest. Okay? So, "bedlam" basically means chaos and disorder, something that is

not organized. And we often use the preposition, "in" before "bedlam". So: "It was in bedlam.",

or: "The streets were in bedlam." or: "It's bedlam in here." It's chaos, it's disorder.

The next noun is: "gall". Okay? So if we look at the sentence:

"She had the gall to call me lazy!" So if someone calls you lazy, you're probably

very offended and you think: "I can't believe that person said that." I can't believe they

had the nerve - okay? - to actually say that. So, "gall" basically refers to the bold courage

or the nerve to say something. So it refers to your nerve or bold courage. Okay?

Next up, we have: "juxtaposition". Very good word, especially in academics and especially

if you're writing essays of comparison and contrast. So the sentence we have is:

"A child next to an old man is a strong juxtaposition." So, the word "juxtaposition", the word "juxta"

actually means near and "position" means position, so near in position. When two things are in

juxtaposition, it just means they are near to each other, placed next to each other.

And we often juxtapose which is the verb form, we juxtapose two things that are different

from each other to compare them, to contrast things. Okay? So, basically, "juxtaposition"

means near in position. And commonly, this word is used when you want to compare and

contrast two things that are not the same, that are not alike. So you place things in

juxtaposition with one another, near to each other, and then you can compare them, contrast

Next up: "quagmire". If we have this sentence: "The war has created a quagmire."

So when you think about a war happening anywhere in the world, it's probably a very difficult

situation for citizens and that is precisely what a quagmire is, is that it's a difficult,

hard situation that is difficult to escape, that is difficult to get out of. All right?

So a quagmire, we're going to say a difficult situation. Okay? So think about being stuck

in like mud and... And you can't really escape or it's difficult to escape the mud. And specifically,

we more talk about the situation of, you know, wars or personal situations that are quagmires.

And finally, we have: "rabble". And in this sentence, we have:

"The police couldn't control the rabble." So, the rabble, going back to protests, refers

to the common people. Now, the rabble specifically refers to a group of disorderly people or

a mob you can say. So rabble is basically a mob of common people or citizens.

And just to give you one bonus vocabulary, the word, "rabble", a person who excites the

rabble, excites the common people and leads the protest is called: "a rabble rouser".

And I'm going to write that here for you guys, "a rabble rouser". So this is the person,

the person who excites the people, and says: "Come on, let's go! We're going to fight back

against the government or fight back against the police." They are called "a rabble rouser"

because they excite or rouse the rabble, the common people, the mob. Okay?

All right, guys, so one more time. "Bedlam" refers to chaos and disorder. "Gall" refers

to the nerve or the courage, the bold courage to do something. Juxt-... "A juxtaposition"

is basically a comparison of two things that are next two each other. "A quagmire" is a

situation that is difficult to escape from. And "rabble", a mob of common people.

So, as always, if you'd like to check your understanding of this vocabulary, you can

do the quiz on www.engvid.com. And don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel.