confabulate

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 26, 2026 is: confabulate • \kun-FAB-yuh-layt\  • verb Confabulate has two very different meanings. Most of the time, to confabulate is to generate a false memory by filling in memory gaps with fabrications. An older meaning, still in use, is "to talk informally; to chat." // Patients who have this type of memory disorder are known to confabulate. See the entry > Examples: "My dearly-loved sister, Marj, died suddenly one month ago at 93. ... No one else will remember the glint that lit Dad's eyes when Mom announced, 'I'm baking a batch of Mrs. Mahoney's cookies.' I can smell that molasses now. ... I miss her, and especially dread the loss of her as a companion in our treasure-trove of joint memories. Who else can set the record straight when I confabulate?" — Larry Beahan, The Buffalo News, 17 Aug. 2025 Did you know? There are multiple ways to confabulate. If you want to do it the original way, you’ll simply have a chat with someone. People have been confabulating with one another thusly since the early 1600s. Today, however, the word is usually used with the meaning it took on in the early 1900s, and especially in contexts relating to psychology: confabulating in this way means fabricating memories especially to fill memory gaps. In the 2000s, confabulate is taking on a new use. Artificial intelligence that produces false output is also now sometimes said to be confabulating, i.e. hallucinating. The ultimate source of this versatile word is the Latin noun fābula, which refers to a conversation or a story, and is also the root of fabulous, as well as fable.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 25, 2026 is: tactile • \TAK-tul\  • adjective Tactile typically describes something, such as a sensation or experience, relating to the sense of touch. It can also be used specifically to describe something that is perceptible by touch. // With the introduction of haptics to smartphones, receiving a call from a friend became a much more tactile experience. See the entry > Examples: “Streaming music services are great and their recommendation engines will serve up endless new tracks for listening. But vinyl records have a tactile appeal.” — Mike Snider, USA Today, 17 Apr. 2026 Did you know? Tactile has many relatives in English, from the sometimes-synonymous tangible to familiar words like intact, tact, tangent, contingent, and even entire. All of these can be traced back to the Latin verb tangere, meaning “to touch.” Tactile was adopted by English speakers in the early 1600s (possibly by way of the French tactile) from the Latin adjective tactilis (“tangible”). In light of tactile having tangere for a touchstone, its dual senses of “perceptible by touch” and “of, relating to, or being the sense of touch” are perfectly sensible. Since the advent of film, television, and touchscreens, a new sense also appears to be developing, as tactile is increasingly used to suggest that something visual is particularly evocative or suggestive of a certain texture.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 24, 2026 is: pundit • \PUN-dit\  • noun A pundit is someone, especially an expert, who presents their opinions and ideas on a particular subject via the media. // Grandpa likes watching political pundits spar about the issues of the day on the Sunday morning talk shows. See the entry > Examples: “… fashion pundits slammed the costumes, with some likening them to fast-fashion copies of the beloved icon’s high-fashion looks.” — Booth Moore, The Wrap, 13 Feb. 2026 Did you know? It’s no hot take to say that the original pundits were highly learned scholars and teachers in India; it’s just a statement of fact. Our English word pundit comes from the Hindi word paṇḍit, a term of respect (and sometimes an honorary title) for a wise person, especially one with knowledge of philosophy, religion, and law; its ultimate source is the Sanskrit word paṇḍita, meaning “learned.” (Pandit today also increasingly refers specifically to a Hindu priest.) English speakers have used pundit to refer to sages of India since the 1600s, but as is typically done with English, they eventually pushed the word into new semantic territory. By the late 1800s, pundit could also refer to a member of what is sometimes called the commentariat or punditocracy—that is, the collective group of political commentators, financial analysts, and newspaper columnists paid to share their views on various subjects.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 23, 2026 is: compendious • \kum-PEN-dee-us\  • adjective A compendious book, research paper, article, etc. is one that provides most or all of the information one may want or require. Similarly, a person might be said to have compendious knowledge of a subject if they have a full and wide-ranging—that is, comprehensive—grasp of it. Compendious can also describe something that is both comprehensive and concise, as in “a compendious summary.” // The coveted book prize was awarded to a compendious history of environmental literature in the United States. See the entry > Examples: “For much of a career that spanned decades, he pursued the oscines, or songbirds, of the Neotropics to their habitats in the Southern Hemisphere—sketching, making compendious field notes, and amassing a vast file of images that he used as a reference tool when painting the plates for definitive books …” — Guy Trebay, The Boston Globe, 26 July 2026 Did you know? When Noah Webster titled his first dictionary, published in 1806, A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language, he used compendious to mean “short, brief, concise, summary,” as he defined it on the book's 58th page. This may come as a surprise given that compendious is now most often used to mean “comprehensive” and is applied to books, papers, etc. that are quite lengthy. But Webster’s Compendious Dictionary was no more than a preparation for his two-volume An American Dictionary of the English Language (1828), and compendious traces back to the Latin adjective compendiōsus, meaning “both comprehensive and succinct.” Webster’s title signaled that his debut word compendium would be useful, if not exhaustive. Today, however, compendious asserts comprehensiveness, typically without brevity.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 22, 2026 is: nemesis • \NEM-uh-siss\  • noun A nemesis is a formidable foe—an opponent or enemy who is very difficult to defeat. As a proper noun, Nemesis refers to the Greek goddess of vengeance. // She will be playing against her old nemesis for the championship. See the entry > Examples: "There were never any doubts about the man playing He-Man's nemesis, Skeletor. ... Frank Langella had caught Goddard's eye in 'Amadeus' on Broadway, and—buried under some impressive make-up—relished the opportunity to ham it up as Eternia's villain-in-chief." — Richard Edwards, Space.com, 12 Aug. 2026 Did you know? Nemesis was the Greek goddess of vengeance, a deity who doled out rewards for noble acts and punishment for evil ones. The Greeks believed that Nemesis didn't always punish an offender immediately but might wait generations to avenge a crime. In English, nemesis originally referred to someone who brought a just retribution, but nowadays people are more likely to see simple animosity rather than justice in the actions of a nemesis.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 21, 2026 is: elegiac • \el-uh-JYE-ak\  • adjective Elegiac means “of, relating to, or comprising an elegy," an elegy being a sorrowful poem or song, and especially one that expresses sorrow for someone who is dead. Elegiac often describes a poem, song, piece of writing, etc. that mourns something now past. // The elegiac tone of the singer’s first album always leaves me in tears. See the entry > Examples: “[Jacqueline] Harpman was writing in a different era, but the elegiac loneliness of her fiction anticipates our own solitary and screen-bound present. Is there anyone out there? her book seems to ask. How do I find you?” — Katy Waldman, The New Yorker, 3 Aug. 2026 Did you know? As a wise man once sang, “sad songs say so much.” Just how much they say has never been definitively quantified, but it is notable that English has the perfect adjective, elegiac, to describe things that are sorrowful or nostalgic in ways that suggest poetic and musical tearjerkers. Elegiac was borrowed into English in the 15th century from the Late Latin adjective elagiacus, which in turn comes from the Greek word elegeiakos. Elegeiakos traces back to the Greek word for “elegiac couplet,” which was elegeion. It is no surprise, then, that the earliest meaning of elegiac referred to such poetic couplets. These days, of course, the word is also used to describe anything sorrowful or nostalgic. As you may have guessed, another descendant of elegeion in English is elegy, which in its oldest sense refers to a poem in elegiac couplets, and now can also refer to a somewhat broader range of laments for something or someone that is now lost.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 20, 2026 is: volition • \voh-LISH-un\  • noun Volition is a formal word that means “the power to make your own choices or decisions.” Usually, though not always, volition follows own, as in “left the company of her own volition.” // Every choice I made was of my own volition and not due to outside influence. See the entry > Examples: “Believe it or not, a lot of people find worms in their birdbaths. … Some birds, most notably crows, like to give their food a good dunking before eating, so there’s a possibility worms in the birdbath were left by these fastidious birds. The most likely reason is that the worms crawled there on their own volition.” — Joan Morris, The Marin Independent Journal (San Rafael, California), 3 May 2026 Did you know? When you do something of your own volition, you do it voluntarily, which makes sense—both volition and voluntary ultimately come from the Latin velle, meaning “to wish” or “to will.” English speakers borrowed volition from French in the 17th century, using it at first to mean “an act of choosing,” a meaning Herman Melville employed in Moby-Dick (1851): “Almost simultaneously, with a mighty volition of ungraduated, instantaneous swiftness, the White Whale darted through the weltering sea.” By then, however, the word had also developed an additional meaning, “the power to choose,” which is now more common.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 19, 2026 is: aggrandize • \uh-GRAN-dyze\  • verb To aggrandize someone (or something) is to enhance their power, wealth, position, or reputation. Aggrandize can also mean "to increase or enlarge" or "to praise highly." // Critics of the book argue that the author aggrandizes corrupt politicians. See the entry > Examples: "... many congregants spoke of their admiration for Tsietsi. They came forward to tell stories of previous encounters with him. While some were obvious fabrications, meant to aggrandize the narrator by his association with Tsietsi, most seemed true." — Lynda Schuster, Literary Hub, 16 June 2026 Did you know? Aggrandize is a grand word, and we don't just mean that in praise. The word literally traces back to the Latin adjective grandis, meaning "fully grown, large, great," and it has enhanced the English language for over three centuries. Nowadays, aggrandize is often paired with self, either the word or the prefix: to "aggrandize oneself" or to "be self-aggrandizing" is to glorify oneself, or to intently pursue power, wealth, and the like. It's of course great to take pride in a job well done, but we appreciate those who keep it real—after all, not every hit can be a grand slam.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 18, 2026 is: churlish • \CHUR-lish\  • adjective Churlish is a formal word used to describe someone or something that is impolite or rude. // I was shocked by the churlish remarks made by my opponent. See the entry > Examples: “… I think a Bob Dylan concert is fundamentally for Bob Dylan himself. You could call it churlish, but I think it’s self-assuredness, an elder’s clarity: The man has a message he needs to send, a message important enough that he’ll strip away anything that might distract from it. A Bob Dylan concert is not about what Bob Dylan’s audience wants to hear; it’s about what Bob Dylan wants to say even if he, you know, mumbles a bit.” —Jared Kaufman, The St. Paul (Minnesota) Pioneer Press, 7 July 2026 Did you know? In Old English, the word ceorl referred to a free peasant—someone who was neither part of the nobility nor enslaved or in debt. In Anglo-Saxon England, which lasted roughly from the 5th to 11th centuries, ceorls had many rights that peasants of lower social status did not, and a few even rose to the rank of thane, becoming a member of a kind of local nobility. However, as most ceorls were driven into the class of unfree villeins serving feudal lords over the centuries, especially following the Norman Conquest, the connotation of the word ceorl—spelled cherl in Middle English and then finally churl—diminished as well, eventually coming to mean “a lowly peasant” and later “a rude, coarse person.” Similarly, churlish began in the form ceorlisc in Old English as a simple descriptor of someone with the rank of ceorl, but today it describes a boorish person, or their rude and insensitive behavior.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 17, 2026 is: watershed • \WAW-ter-shed\  • noun Watershed, used figuratively, refers to a crucial dividing point, line, or factor. Used literally, the word may refer to a ridge from which rivers drain on either side, or to the area of land that includes a particular river or lake and all the rivers, streams, etc. that flow into it. : a crucial dividing point, line, or factor // The protests marked a watershed in the nation’s history. // The Continental Divide is the most well known watershed in the United States. See the entry > Examples: “For thousands of years, elk would have accounted for the second largest amount of meat in the diets of many eastern peoples, after the ubiquitous whitetail deer. Not only were the animals present in the East; for thousands of years they sustained human life and were integral to Indigenous material and spiritual culture. Although they were great and skilled hunters, Native Americans in the East rarely killed all of the elk or all of the deer in an entire watershed.” — Andrew Moore, Beasts of the East: The Fall and Rise of America’s Eastern Wilderness, 2026 Did you know? Opinion on the literal geographic meaning of watershed is divided. On one side of the debate are those who think the word can only refer to a ridge of land separating rivers and streams flowing in one direction from those flowing in the opposite direction. That’s the term’s original meaning, one probably borrowed in the translation of the German Wasserscheide. On the other side of the argument are those who think watershed can also apply to the area through which such divided water flows. The latter sense is now far more common in America, but most speakers have apparently decided to leave the quarrel to hydrologists and geographers, choosing to limit their use of watershed to its figurative “turning point” sense.