jet-, -ject, -jecting, -jected, -jection, -jector, -jectory; jacu-, jac-

(Latin: throw, send, fling, hurl, cast; gush; spurt)

abject (AB jekt", ab JEKT) (adjective); more abject, most abject
1. Pertaining to the most contemptible kind, despicable; referring to a situation that is miserable or hopeless: The soldier deserted like an abject coward.

Walter's aunt was in an abject mood brought on by the secret knowledge that her hero was in fact an abject wimp with feet of clay.

The old couple have been living in abject poverty since their pensions were reduced.

2. Concerning the most miserable kind, wretched; descriptive of the absolute worst or most extreme thing: Since the flood, Kristin's friends have been living in an abject situation as they try to clean up the mud in their house, get rid of and replace furniture that can no longer be used, and fix other damages done to their house.

Tracie and her two children have been trying to survive in her old car for over a month under the most abject conditions, including being without toilet facilities, not having enough food or water, etc., etc.

3. Etymology: a transition from the literal to the figurative, and from cause to effect, has occurred in the meaning of abject. ab-, meaning "off, away", and jacere, meaning "to throw", were combined in Latin to form abjicere, "to throw away", with a past participle abjectus, "thrown away".

Directly from this source came the English word abject, which was formerly not only an adjective but also a verb meaning "to cast off, to throw down", and with a figurative application, "to degrade".

It is this latter meaning that survives in the Modern English adjective abject which characterizes someone who has been cast off or degraded and who is therefore low in condition or cast down in spirit.

—Compiled from information located in Picturesque Word Origins;
G. & C. Merriam Company; Springfield, Massachusetts; 1933; pages 4 and 5.
Sunk to a low condition, cast down in spirit.
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Miserable, wretched, terrible situation.
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Miserable, wretched, cast down in spirit.
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abjection (s) (noun), abjections (pl)
1. A low or downcast state, humiliation: The abjection of poverty made it difficult for Eileen to raise her children and send them to school.
2. A condition of being servile, wretched, or contemptible: In school, the students studied the various abjections of human situations and learned strategies that would help them to avoid miserable lives in the future.
abjectly (adverb); more abjectly, most abjectly
1. Concerning how something exists or is done with great shame; desperately: Too many people in the world remain abjectly poor.

Jeffrey sighed and abjectly walked away after being exposed as a swindler.

2. Regarding how a situation is handled in a hopeless resigned manner: Joshua abjectly shrugged his shoulders when his wife started another session of complaining.
A low condition as abject poverty.
—Authorized usage by Word A Day Revisited.
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abjectness (s) (noun), abjectnesses (pl)
1. A condition in which a person is down in spirit or hope; miserableness: Jack's abjectness was caused by the fact that he had been walking all day at the book fair and his feet were hurting.
2. The submissiveness or fawning in attitude or behavior: Terri's abjectness revealed that she was so servile and overly willing to serve or to obey other people that no one respected her.
adjectival (s), adjectivals (pl) (nouns)
Words or phrases that modify nouns or pronouns: "There are several types of adjectivals; including, adjectives, adjectival prepositional phrases, participial phrases, and relative clauses all of which can help a writer make language more creative, interesting, and colorful."

"Without adjectivals, much of the color in language would be lost and these words allow people to describe in more detail the nouns and pronouns about which they are speaking or writing."

"Adjectivals modify nouns and pronouns by providing information that answers the following questions about nouns or pronouns: What kind? Which one? How many? or How much?"

adjectival (ajective), more adjectival, most adjectival
In grammar, pertaining to the function as an adjective: An adjectival word describes a person or thing, for example the word "fancy" is used in an adjectival way in "a fancy dress".
adjectivally
adjective (s) (noun), adjectives (pl)
1. In grammar, a word that is used to describe a noun or a pronoun by providing more information about that part of speech: Adjectives slightly change the meanings of other words by adding descriptions or by making them more specific.
2. Any member of a class of words that, in many languages, are distinguished in form, as partly in English, and which have comparative and superlative endings: Adjectives function as modifiers of nouns, such as "good", "wise", "perfect", "beautiful", "bad", "sad", "loud", etc.

The three most common adjectives are the articles: "a", "an", and "the". The "a" and "an" are the indefinite articles and refer to any one of a class of nouns. "The" is a definite article that refers to a specific noun.

Examples of the indefinite articles, or adjectives, are "a contest", and "an opportunity". A definite article sample is "the writer".

adjectively
adjectivum; adj., adi.
Adjective.

Used in grammar when referring to a modifier (descriptive word/words) of a noun or a pronoun.

auditory synesthesia (s) (noun), auditory synesthesias (pl)
A hearing sensation that occurs when another sense is stimulated: When LuAnn felt vibrations in her fingertips, she also experienced auditory synesthesia, sensing the sound that the vibrations might have made.
auroral electrojet
A strong current of electricity which flows through the auroral zone during a polar substorm.

A geomagnetic perturbation (confusion or disorder) lasting one to two hours, which tends to occur during a local post-midnight time.

The magnitude of the substorm is largest in the auroral zone and corresponds to an injection of charged particles from the magnetotail into the auroral oval.

conjecturable (adjective) (not comparable)
Capable of being guessed: The accurate spot where Lynn's brother was buried was conjecturable, and so a name plate was provided since no one knew exactly where he was buried in the cemetery.
conjecturably (adverb), conjecturably, most conjecturably
Pertaining to how an opinion or theory is based only on speculation and without evidence of proof: Mark made his decision conjecturably by believing what he had heard from his friends and not from the specialists themselves.
conjectural