Vocabulary for Research Paper Assignment Evaluating Nonviolent versus Violent Strategies

I render to my students in the New Salem Educational Initiative a great deal of explicitly learned vocabulary.  This is very important for students whose parents or significant adults have limited education, do not read very much diverse and challenging material, or are not native English speakers.  The list given here is derived from the sources used in researching the paper, and from the terms that I use in writing the model research paper.

1.  consummation >>>>>    final act of accomplishment of a task, often having moved through various stages toward completion

2.  manifestation  >>>>>  the physical form or action that clearly represents or demonstrates an idea

 3.  elucidate  >>>>>  to make clear through vivid explanation, often with the provision of clarifying

 examples

4.  ontological  >>>>>  adjective describing philosophical speculation on the being or existence of

humankind

 5.  epistemological  >>>>>  adjective describing philosophical speculation or logically sequenced

reasoning concerning knowledge and ways of knowing


6.  relativism  >>>>>  the  philosophical position that Truth may vary place, time, and circumstances

7.  acquiescence  >>>>>  going along with, complying, being compliant

 8.  cognizable  >>>>>  recognizable, comprehensible,  knowable

 9.  espouse   >>>>>  to posit, promulgate, or put forward one’s ideas

10.  exposition  >>>>>  reasoned and logically sequenced presentation of one’s ideas

11.  votary  >>>>>  worshiper;  devotee

12.  voluntarism >>>>>  happening due to human choice, rather than according to some predetermined set of circumstances

13.  determinism  >>>>>  happening due to some predetermined, already decided set of circumstances, rather than as a matter of human volition or choice

                          

14.  elegy  >>>>>  a poetic, serious, and pensive tribute, most notably given in behalf of the recently

deceased

15.  subversive  >>>>>  secretly working to undermine or destroy established practices

16.  seditious  >>>>>  subversive, with the implication of social unacceptability or illegality

17.  deprecation  >>>>>  demeaning or belittling a person or a way of thinking

18.  bourgeois  >>>>>  adjective describing a middle class of people and their values, positioned between the aristocracy (those of nobility and wealth as a matter of birth) and the proletariat

19.  bourgeoisie  >>>>>  a middle class of people and their values, positioned between the aristocracy and the proletariat

20.  proletariat  >>>>>  the working class, especially those performing wage labor in urban factories

21.  feudalism  >>>>>  the political and economic system prevalent in the European Middle Ages,

dominated by the aristocracy, for whom serfs labored in residentially permanent circumstances on land held as fiefdoms (granted by the monarch or other authority)

22.  capitalism  >>>>>  economic system characterized by a high degree of individual

entrepreneurial (commercially enterprising, venturous) freedom

23.  socialism  >>>>>  economic system characterized by a high degree of government

involvement and oversight

24.  irreconcilable  >>>>>  the inability to reconcile or to bring two contending forces together

25.  materialism  >>>>>  philosophy or outlook referring to reality as observed in the physical world 

26.  idealism  >>>>>  philosophy or outlook referring to reality perceived through cognition and

reasoning, revealed in the realm of ideas  

27.  totalitarianism  >>>>>  political system in which the government is active in every aspect of the

lives of people under that government’s authority and jurisdiction

28.  dialectic  >>>>>  the process whereby an initial idea or circumstance (thesis) interacts with

another idea or circumstance (antithesis) to create a completely new idea or circumstance
(synthesis)

 

29.  pacifism  >>>>>  the philosophical commitment to peace under all circumstances---  including

a vow to condemn and refuse to participate in warfare 

30.  monumental  >>>>>  occurring on a grand scale

31.  metaphysical  >>>>>  adjective that covers the broad range of considerations important in philosophical thought, such as ontology and epistemology;  now in practical usage tends to connote that realm of knowledge that is so abstract as to defy certain understanding---  by contrast with the move provable findings of natural science  

32.  coherence  >>>>>  having unity in thought;  fitting together in a logical pattern;  making sense

as an understandable whole


33.  divergent  >>>>>  moving in different directions;  going off along diverse pathways

34.  boycott  >>>>>  the refusal to purchase goods or services from those whose practices are

considered unjust


35.  stagnant  >>>>>  remaining the same, typically amidst corrupted or polluted circumstances

 36.  agape  >>>>>  Greek term for the love of all humankind;  universal love;  the altruistic and empathic love that abides in a person’s heart for every other human being 

37.  philia >>>>>  Greek term for the love that abides in a person’s heart for friends, family members, and other close associates

38.  eros  >>>>>  Greek term for romantic or sexual love

39.  spiteful  >>>>>  vengeful;  full of ill-feeling and the desire to inflict harm in word or deed

40.  lexicon  >>>>>  set of words used for particular subject manner or in a given cultural context

41.  stark  >>>>>  bracingly or startlingly frank, blunt, or apparent