Grade 12 Vocabulary List, Week of 03/03

Abnegation

n. denial (esp. self-denial)

Agrarianism

n. a social or political movement designed to bring about land reforms or to improve the economic status of the farmer

Centrifugal

adj. proceeding or acting in a direction away from a center or axis : using or acting by the apparent force that is felt by an object moving in a curved path that acts outwardly away from the center of rotation; adj. tending away from centralization : separatist

Centripetal

adj. proceeding or acting in a direction toward a center or axis; adj. tending toward centralization : unifying

Paternalism

n. a system under which an authority undertakes to supply needs or regulate conduct of those under its control in matters affecting them as individuals as well as in their relations to authority and to each other

Nihilism

n. a viewpoint that traditional values and beliefs are unfounded and that existence is senseless and useless; n. a doctrine or belief that conditions in the social organization are so bad as to make destruction desirable for its own sake independent of any constructive program or possibility

Monism

n. a view that there is only one kind of ultimate substance : the view that reality is one unitary organic whole with no independent parts

Materialism

n. a preoccupation with or stress upon material rather than intellectual or spiritual things; n. a doctrine that the only or the highest values or objectives lie in material well-being and in the furtherance of material progress

Matriculate

v. to enroll as a member of a body and especially of a college or university

Alleviate

v. to make (something, such as pain or suffering) more bearable; v. to partially remove or correct (something undesirable)