Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A definite liking; a strong inclination. See Synonyms at predilection.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Strong inclination; decided taste; liking; bias.
Wiktionary
- n. taste, liking, or inclination (for)
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. Inclination; decided taste; bias.
- n. (Card Playing) A game like bézique, or, in the game, any queen and jack of different suits held together.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a strong liking
Etymologies
- Borrowing from French penchant, present participle of pencher ("to tilt, to lean"), from Middle French, from Old French pengier ("to tilt, be out of line"), from Vulgar Latin *pendicāre, a derivative of Latin pendere ("to hang, to lean"). (Wiktionary)
- French, from present participle of pencher, to incline, from Old French, from Vulgar Latin *pendicāre, from Latin pendēre, to hang; see (s)pen- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“His penchant is for the gargantuan – auto companies, school violence, capitalism, health care.”
“That agents of the state of Israel are behind much if not all of the "Hamas rockets" is a reasonable conclusion and backed up by the Israeli governments long term penchant for fabricating Muslim terrorism.”
“And he fears updating the Copyright Act will blow up because of the Tory's short-term penchant for slogans and electioneering.”
“The cable is embarrassing for Mr. King, whose r ole in setting the country ' s interest rate is supposed to be apolitical and has fed into mounting criticism of the central banker for what has been described as his penchant for exerting political pressure.”
The Wall Street Journal: U.K. Officials Brace For New WikiLeaks Revelations
“FAIR called his penchant for attacking Muslim countries "an O'Reilly trademark", and "his disregard for Muslim civilians is matched by the anti-Muslim sentiments he frequently expresses on both his nationally syndicated radio show, the Radio Factor," reaching 3.5 million listeners, and his top-rated FNC show.”
“And might this be related to what others have termed our penchant for reliance on 'basic-level categories.”
“We're up here knocking about a little, partly to hunt, but mostly because I've a penchant, that is, a weakness for exploring out-of-the-way places.”
“Karamargin, a spokesman for Ms. Giffords, called her penchant for frugality.”
“The color of the letters seems very Howard Hughes," she said, referring to his penchant for sultry actresses like Ava Gardner and Rita Hayworth.”
“Writer Lionel Shriver writers recalls a penchant for writing long, febrile short stories and supporting unpopular political positions.”
Telegraph.co.uk: news, business, sport, the Daily Telegraph newspaper, Sunday Telegraph
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘penchant’.
-
GRE 2014
abate, abdicate, abase, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abjure, abortive, abound, abrasive, abreast, abridge and 1577 more...
-
EN - fine scholarly language
exhort, accretion, twenty-nine, atrophy, additive, brilliantly, interreligious, empiricism, pathologic, limitless, half-century, vigilant and 488 more...
-
GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
-
501
Classic
mete, ire, bane, bilk, boor, elan, ado, toil, onus, aberration, abstruse, anomaly and 401 more...
-
GRE Barron's 800
zealot, wistful, welter, wary, whimsical, warranted, vortex, vivisection, volatile, vitiate, viscous, visage and 787 more...
-
AFET - diplomacy
broker a peace ac..., client state, deadlocked peace ..., embassy, freeze, goodwill ambassador, hinterland, interfere in dome..., intervene personally, maintain technica..., mediation, no business as usual and 670 more...
-
501
Classic
aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august, banal, boisterous, dulcet, epitome, impudent, insolent, mellifluous and 401 more...
-
From reading
Collected from reading
venerate, reprobate, reticent, adoration, ethereal, ephemeral, equivocal, contumacious, heinous, solicitous, agnostic, aberration and 335 more...
-
perrch
perch, fallow, gale, sparrows, dreary, crust, tramped, glare, plod, trudge, tramp, tumble and 12 more...
-
501
Classic
aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august, banal, boisterous, dulcet, epitome, impudent, insolent, mellifluous and 401 more...
-
501
Classic
aberration, abstruse, anomaly, assiduous, august, banal, boisterous, dulcet, epitome, impudent, insolent, mellifluous and 401 more...
-
Words build meanings from origins( et...
These come from gamma meditation ,I think.
discursive, exogenous, machinations, purportedly, sumptuous, congruity, cantankerous, incongruous, festoon, hessian, ratiocinative, stratigraphic and 2046 more...
-
GRE
predilection, explicit, appeal, supplication, appealing, enchanting, ovation, pertinent, apropos, opportunely, applicable, germane and 381 more...
-
P
letters starting with p
predicament, presumptuous, predilection, plausible, preeminent, plaintive, paragon, partisan, pathological, paucity, pedantic, penchant and 28 more...
-
Nouns
weequash, aquabib, selcouth, tyrotoxism, sylph, penchant, adjuration, incantation, hummel, pyromancer, rhabdomancer, hydromancer and 14 more...
-
Nouns
an element, an aspect, a component, significant growth, transition, hiccups, labour, predecessor, delight, lawsuit, penchant, entrepreneurship and 23 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for penchant.
arby 1672, from Fr. penchant, properly the prp. of O.Fr. pencher "to incline," from V.L. *pendicare, a frequentative formed from L. pendere "to hang" (see pendant). Oct 18, 2007