vicissitude
5
9.9
- noun
- /vɪˈsɪsɪˌtud/
- Literature
:
vicisitud
- And I do feel like my main aim in my professional work is to try to help people understand the normal vicissitudes of adolescence.
- vicissitudes of life
- political vicissitudes
- vicissitudes of history
I want my hat to, to show the vicissitudes of its history.
- I want my hat to, to show the vicissitudes of its history.
- And I do feel like my main aim in my professional work is to try to help people understand the normal vicissitudes of adolescence.
Examples
-
Other nations have come over time to expect and grudgingly accept such vicissitudes in American economic policy.
Academic text (1993) -
I suspect that, like me, this is not how you wanted to spend your holidays, but such are the vicissitudes of life.
-
As you grow up, as you become more mature, your ability to deal with the vicissitudes of life gets so much better.
-
The past was a reminder of the vicissitudes of life, chance playing off opportunity and giving back what she would.
Fiction book (1993) -
There is no question that humanity has found ways of buffering its well-being from the vicissitudes of the environment.
Academic text (1995) -
To this degree, bilateral environmental relations are insulated from the vicissitudes of diplomatic relations between the top leadership of each country.
Academic text (2004) -
Given various political, economic, and social vicissitudes, the geographic extent of Kurdistan has varied considerably over the centuries.
Academic text (2004) -
And works of art, like beloved parents pummeled by energetic children, survive the vicissitudes of their interpretations.
Academic text (1995) -
As Jerome Bruner deftly observes, "There is widespread agreement that stories are about the vicissitudes of human intention" (18).
Academic text (1997) -
As you grow up, your ability to deal with the vicissitudes of life gets so much better.
Synonyms
75
3.7
A bad event that causes trouble
71
4.9
A difficult time when you face many problems
12
9.5
An unexpected, unexplained change in a situation or a person's behavior
1
6.8
A time when someone has bad luck
A sudden change in a story when a character's luck turns bad
A situation in which bad things keep happening to someone
Antonyms
How Significant
176
7.0
51
6.9
- Literature
5
9.9
∞
1.1
102
3.3
28
3.9
Surface Forms
Morphology
vicissitude = viciss + itude
A learned Latinate formation: the root element is not a recognisable English base and the suffix -itude does not make the meaning obvious to an average B1 learner.
Etymology
Vicissitude comes from the Latin root vicis, which means 'change' or 'turn', and you can see the same idea in the phrase vice versa ('the other way around'). So a vicissitude is one of life's 'turns', an unexpected change in luck or situation.