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Word of the Day:

February 22, 2016

bumptious

adjective BUMP-shus

What it Means

: presumptuously, obtusely, and often noisily self-assertive : obtrusive

Bumptious in Context

The talk show often features interesting guests, but the bumptious host's tendency to turn the interview back to himself can get annoying.

"He had a sense of himself that was strong; that’s why he was successful as an actor. But he was never bumptious or presumptive, he was gentle." — Brian Cox, quoted in The Guardian, 15 Jan. 2016

More example sentences

Did You Know?

Etymologists believe that bumptious was probably coined, perhaps playfully, from the noun bump plus -tious. (Think of the obtrusive way an overly assertive person might "bump" through a crowd.) When bumptious was first used around 1800, it meant "conceited." Charles Dickens used it that way in David Copperfield: "His hair was very smooth and wavy; but I was informed … that it was a wig … and that he needn't be so 'bounceable'—somebody else said 'bumptious'—about it, because his own red hair was very plainly to be seen behind."

Name That Synonym

What 5-letter adjective is a synonym of bumptious that begins with "b" and can also mean "audacious" or "impudent"?

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