profundicate
/pɹəˈfʌndɪˌkeɪt/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 0.00 in modern English
20
Scrabble Score
12
Letters
3
Syllables
12
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To make profound; to make a concept unnecessarily complicated.
Example Sentences
- "To profundify or to profundicate: A Borenverb used to denote the use of thesauric and other enrichment techniques to make a simple idea appear to be profound. […] Graduates of agricultural institutions tend to use "to profundicate" while graduates of ivy league schools tend to use "to profundify"."
- "You should learn to profundify and to profundicate. Those are Boren verbs; they're not in the dictionary yet, but we're working on it and we think we're going to make it. They're being used in Washington now and Time Magazine, the Wall Street Journal; and a few others have picked it up."
- "Profundify or profundicate the speech. Use Roget's Thesaurus to make simple ideas seem profound."
- "Who has not suffered from “bureaucratese” – turgid unnecessarily complex descriptions that yield only to the most persistent. […] Examples include “mumblistic” (planned mumbling) and “profundicating” (translating simple concepts into obscure jargon) (Boren, 1972). The remedy is to simplify and clarify."
Etymology
Word Breakdown
- Suffix: icate