Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for April 5, 2024 is: meticulous  \muh-TIK-yuh-lus\ adjective  
Something or someone described as meticulous shows extreme or excessive care in the consideration or treatment of details.

// He is meticulous about keeping accurate records.

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/meticulous)  
  
Examples:
  
"In a press release, the company touts its meticulous approach to the sandwich's creation—testing pickles with eight variations of thickness and more than 10 bun recipes with six different bakeries." — Alicia Kelso, Forbes, 7 Jan. 2021  
  
Did you know?  
   
We're afraid we have some strange etymological news: meticulous comes from the Latin word for "fearful"—metīculōsus—and ultimately from the Latin noun metus, meaning "fear." Although meticulous currently has no "fearful" meanings, it was originally used as a synonym of "frightened" and "timid." This sense had fallen into disuse by 1700, and in the 1800s meticulous acquired a new meaning of "overly and timidly careful" (possibly due to the influence of the French word méticuleux). This meaning in turn led to the current one of "painstakingly careful," with no connotations of fear at all. The newest use was controversial for a time, but it is now by far the most common meaning; even the most meticulous (or [persnickety](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/persnickety), depending on your view) among us consider it perfectly acceptable.

meticulous

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Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for May 8, 2024 is: reputation  \rep-yuh-TAY-shun\ noun  
A reputation is the common opinion that people have about someone or something. Reputation can also refer to a positive position that someone or something has in public esteem or regard.

// She's earned a reputation as a first-class playwright.

// Investors feared that the scandal had damaged the company's reputation  beyond repair.

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reputation)  
  
Examples:
  
"[Menton](https://www.britannica.com/place/Menton) [France] was once a leading lemon-growing region in Europe, with a global reputation and exports as far as the United States and Russia in the 18th century." — Barbara Surk and Daniel Cole, Quartz, 2 Apr. 2024  
  
Did you know?  
   
An esteemed word in English, reputation rose to fame during the 14th century and ultimately traces back to the Latin verb reputare, meaning "to take into consideration" or "to think over." Reputare is itself a coupling of the well-known "again" prefix [re-](https://bit.ly/3vQ4fal) and the verb putare, "to reckon." Renowned celebrities of the putare family are the verb [repute](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/repute) ("to believe or consider"), the identical [noun](https://bit.ly/49w4Qfi) (synonymous with reputation), the adjectives [reputable](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reputable) and [reputed](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reputed), and the adverb [reputedly](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/reputedly). Other putare cousins of notoriety include [dispute](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dispute), [disreputable](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/disreputable), [imputation](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/imputation), and [putative](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/putative), along with their kin.

reputation

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for May 7, 2024 is: extemporize  \ik-STEM-puh-ryze\ verb  
To extemporize means to do something [extemporaneously](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extemporaneously)—in other words, to improvise.
 
// A good talk show host must be able to extemporize when interviews don’t go as planned.

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extemporize)
  
  
Examples:
  
“The president was fast on his feet. Sensing an opportunity to extemporize, he looked around the chamber, pleased.” — Robin Abcarian, The Los Angeles Times, 12 Feb. 2023  
  
Did you know?  
   
Let’s dive into the essence of extemporize by exploring its origins. (We’ll try not to bore you with too many [extraneous](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extraneous) details.) To extemporize is to say or do something [off-the-cuff](https://bit.ly/4ax9nPs); extemporize was coined by adding the suffix -ize to the Latin phrase ex tempore, meaning “on impulse” or “on the spur of the moment.” (Incidentally, ex tempore was also borrowed wholesale into English with the meaning “in an extemporaneous manner.”) Other descendants of ex tempore include the now rare [extemporal](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extemporal) and [extemporary](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extemporary)—both synonyms of [extemporaneous](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/extemporaneous)—and as you have no doubt guessed by now, extemporaneous itself.

extemporize

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for May 6, 2024 is: plangent  \PLAN-junt\ adjective  
Something, such as a sound, that is described as plangent is loud, deep, and often expressive of sadness or suffering. The word is a synonym of [plaintive](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/plaintive).

// The campers were awoken by the plangent howl of a coyote off in the distance.

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/plangent)  
  
Examples:
  
“Adjuah sings in a keening, plangent tone, but at one point he pauses to offer a spoken invitation: ‘Listen to the wind,’ he says. ‘The voices calling to you from yesterday.’” — Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times, 30 June 2023  
  
Did you know?  
   
Plangent adds power to our poetry and prose: the pounding of waves, the beat of wings, the tolling of a bell, the throbbing of the human heart, a lover’s knocking at the door—all have been described as plangent. The word plangent traces back to the Latin verb plangere, which has two meanings. The first of those meanings, “to strike or beat,” was sometimes used by Latin speakers in reference to striking one’s breast in grief. This led to the verb’s second meaning, “to lament.” The sense division carried over to the Latin adjective plangens and then into English, giving us two distinct meanings of plangent: “pounding” (as in “the plangent roar of waves”) and “expressive of woe, grief, or melancholy.” Like its synonym plaintive, plangent is often used to describe sounds, from bittersweet melodies to the wails of mourners, evoking deep and heartfelt sadness.

plangent

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for May 5, 2024 is: proliferate  \pruh-LIF-uh-rayt\ verb  
To proliferate is to increase quickly in number or amount.

// Problems have proliferated in recent months; every day seems to present a new challenge that needs sorting out.

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/proliferate)
  
  
Examples:
  
“Patches of scrub continue to emerge and then fall away as the canopy of young self-sown trees begins to shade them out. The beavers have created hectares of new open water and channel complexes. Deadwood is ubiquitous. Topsoil continues to grow, and fungi proliferate.” — Isabella Tree, The Book of Wilding: A Practical Guide to Rewilding, Big and Small, 2023  
  
Did you know?  
   
Proliferate is a [back-formation](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/back-formation) of proliferation. That means that proliferation came first (we borrowed it from French in the 1700s), and was later shortened to form the verb. Proliferation originally referred to the botanical phenomenon of some plants having buds, flowers, or other parts that are [adventitious](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/adventitious)—that is, that arise or occur sporadically or in other than the usual location (e.g. [pitch pines’](https://bit.ly/4afWl9o) ability to sprout new trees directly from their stumps after a fire). With advances in the study of biology in the 1800s, proliferation came to be used to refer to the rapid and repeated production of [cells](https://www.britannica.com/science/cell-biology) by division. That sense in turn [begat](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/beget) the verb proliferate, which eventually came to be used when anything—whether living (such as yeast) or nonliving (such as data)—quickly increases or multiplies.

proliferate

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for May 4, 2024 is: agrarian  \uh-GRAIR-ee-un\ adjective  
Something described as agrarian has to do with farms and farming.

// Joan hopes to leave city life behind and move to a more agrarian region where she plans to raise lambs and grow heirloom vegetables. 

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/agrarian)
  
  
Examples:
  
"In an interview, [cultural studies researcher, Toni] Smith said fantasizing about agrarian life is nothing new. History presents cyclical 'back-to-the-land' movements, from America’s early West-settling pioneers to the homesteaders of the Great Depression." — Hannah Macready, Ambrook Research, 17 Aug. 2023  
  
Did you know?  
   
Today, an [acre](https://www.britannica.com/science/acre-unit-of-measurement) is generally considered to be a unit of land measuring 43,560 square feet (4,047 square meters). Before that standard was set, it's believed that an acre represented a rougher measurement: the amount of land that could be plowed in one day with a [yoke](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/yoke) of oxen. Both [acre](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/acre) and agrarian come from the Latin noun ager and the Greek noun agrós, meaning "piece of land; field." (You can probably guess that [agriculture](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/agriculture) is another descendant.) Agrarian, first used in English in the 16th century, describes things pertaining to the cultivation of fields, as well as to the farmers who cultivate them.

meticulous

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