DUPLICITOUS: “deceitful: treacherous, duplicitous behavior” — New Oxford American Dictionary
A friend relates this tale:
I once had a …meeting with someone who used the word “duplicitous” about a million times, when she meant “duplicate.” I couldn’t figure out a nice way to say, “So, you hope the invitations aren’t sneaky and underhanded?”
Why be nice? This is the sort of grandiloquent puffery that keeps Lexicide in business. My goodness, there are so many English words that sound like other English words, yet don’t mean the same. Logically, why would you create two words with the same meaning but vary the spelling by a few letters? That doesn’t make sense at all!
No one uses ironic to refer to laundry pressing. Neither do the police refer to auspicious persons (Dogberry excepted). So everyone, please get real — and use the word you know is right, not the overblown one that’s wrong.
— Otto E. Mezzo
Sighting | http://www.gender.org.uk/conf/2002/profs22.htm
The ability of the nurse specialist to think divergently, mapping the process of integration is only acquired through regular supervision, as is learning how to balance a duplicity of roles…
Ideally there should be clear boundaries around duplicitous roles…
From a talk on nursing care for patients confused about their gender identity. The author obviously took confusion seriously, perhaps because one of her roles was scheming against the others.
2 thoughts on “Duplicitous”