October 30, 2010Word of the Day
MISCONSTRUE \miss-kun-STROO\DEFINITION
verb

: to understand or explain wrongly : misinterpret
EXAMPLES According to the candidate, her comments about the city's schools were misconstrued by the media.

"It's now been 10 years since humans deciphered the digital code that, in a very real sense, defines us as a species. It's hard to overestimate the significance of that achievement -- but easy to misconstrue what it means and where its true promise lies." --From an opinion piece by Dr. James P. Evans in Newsday, June 27, 2010
DID YOU KNOW? In the 14th century, English speakers acquired the closely linked words "construe" and "construction." You may think of "construction" as a word having to do with building houses or highways, but it has long had other meanings, including "arrangement of words in a sentence" and "interpretation." Similarly, "construe" can mean "to analyze the arrangement and connection of words in a sentence" or "to interpret or explain." Both "construe" and "construction" come from the Latin verb "construere" ("to construct or construe"). The "mis-" of "misconstrue" was an English addition; it was added to "construe" in the 15th century to create a word meaning "to put a wrong construction (that is, a wrong interpretation) on."

HE says we have "Misconstrued" his meaning, what he is trying to accomplish.

All I can say is those two little words that THEY fear the most, and that is:

YOU'RE FIRED! Misconstrue THAT! Ok so it's FOUR words. Sheesh!