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Weiyang Luo
Could someone explain a bit about the word "invidious"?Thank you.
Like in the sentence
"Personally I have been put in an invidious position"
I looked up some dictionaries but the explanations are not concise enough to get my head around it.
Would sb expound on it a bit ?
Thank you very much.
29 avr. 2014 22:15
Réponses · 6
2
I'm sorry, but Molly is incorrect or at least incomplete.
Invidious means "tending to cause envy, anger, resentment or, simply, a bad feeling in other people".
So, in other words, something you do or something someone else does causes other people to feel angry, envious or some other negative emotion.
"Personally I have been put in an invidious position."
This *could* mean you are in a difficult/hard situation. But the reason it is hard is because what you have to do will cause OTHERS to had bad feelings toward you.
30 avril 2014
1
Invidious is like 'awkward' or 'difficult'.
'Personally, I have been put in an awkward position.' or 'Personally, I have been put in a difficult position.'
An easier word to remember is 'hard.'
'Personally, I have been put in a hard position.'
But I believe 'awkward' or 'difficult' sound better than 'hard.'
I hope this helps. :D
29 avril 2014
1
I would add to the answers that it is a "literary" kind of word. The reason why it is easy to be mistaken about the precise meaning--Mojave is correct, but I had to look it up to be sure myself--is that it is a word I've often read, particularly in older books, but rarely use. It's not part of my active vocabulary. I know it best as part of a specific expression, "comparisons are invidious," meaning "don't compare people to each other, it just creates bad feeling."
30 avril 2014
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Weiyang Luo
Compétences linguistiques
Chinois (mandarin), Anglais
Langue étudiée
Anglais
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