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  1. maven love

Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A person who has special knowledge or experience; an expert.

Wiktionary

  1. n. A self-styled expert in a given field.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. someone who is dazzlingly skilled in any field

Etymologies

  1. From Yiddish מבֿין (meyvn, "know-it-all"), from Hebrew מֵבִין (mevín, "one who understands, connoisseur, expert"). (Wiktionary)
  2. Yiddish meyvn, from Hebrew mēbîn, active participle of hēbîn, to understand, derived stem of bîn, to discern; see byn in Semitic roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)

Examples

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  • grant_barrett This word was chosen as Wordnik word of the day. Nov 11, 2009

  • sgordonson Source language is Yiddish Jun 8, 2009

  • JSpeyrer an expert, yes; but a person who also shows a personal interest in
    a subject and a liking for it May 17, 2009

  • garyth123 first came across this in connection with aficionados of apple compters mac mavens Dec 6, 2008

  • seanahan My experience with linguists is that they generally speak in a derogatory manner about prescriptivists. Language is constantly evolving, difficult to predict, and often difficult to understand. My understanding of the chapter in The Language Instinct is that he is directly criticizing prescriptivism in general, with the Mavens as the focal point of his derision. Jul 27, 2008

  • sionnach Pinker's use of the term is, in my view, unnecessarily dismissive, and somewhat polemic. In what I think of as a kind of "smear 'n sneer" attack, he paints all language mavens as rabid, reactionary prescriptivists, not to be taken seriously. Though I admire Pinker, and enjoy his writing on language, he does have a tendency to present the position of those who disagree with him in an exaggeratedly negative light. Because Pinker is hyper-articulate and writes with considerable wit, his distortions can be remarkably persuasive. But the reader should take care not to mistake amusing verbal pyrotechnics for reasoned argument.

    In his book "The Tipping Point", Malcolm Gladwell made frequent use of the term maven, but in the context of Gladwell's book, it had generally positive connotations. Jul 27, 2008

  • seanahan Steven Pinker uses the term "The Language Mavens" to describe to newspaper columnists who declare themselves experts on language and stalwarts against change. Jul 27, 2008

  • widget A Yiddish word derived from the Hebrew מבין - one who understands Jul 24, 2008

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‘maven’ has been looked up 5373 times, loved by 12 people, added to 74 lists, commented on 8 times, and has a Scrabble score of 10.