Vocabulary Words Questions For SSC Stenographer PDF
SSC Stenographer Constable Vocabulary Words Question and Answers download PDF based on previous year question paper of SSC Stenographer exam. 18 Very important Vocabulary Words questions for Stenographer Constable.
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Instructions
Read the passage carefully and answer the questions which follow:
About 20 per cent of the United States population (60 million out of 300 million people) are non-native speakers of English. Speaking multiple languages has advantages – for example, you get to talk to people from different cultures. But being a non-native or second-language (L2) speaker also has its challenges. In addition to often feeling self-conscious about their accents, L2 speakers can be viewed by native speakers as less intelligent, and less trustworthy.
Thus it might come as a surprise that, in 1980, Henry Kissinger (the former US secretary of state and a non-native English speaker, originally from Germany) told Arianna Huffington (the Greek immigrant and entrepreneur/writer who would eventually start The Huffington Post) not to worry about [her] accent, ‘because you can never, in American public life, underestimate the advantages of complete and total incomprehensibility’.
Suppose you are at a cocktail party, and your conversation partner – someone with power in your field – wants to know your view about a potentially scandalous issue at your company. You don’t want to divulge what you know, but want the power player on your side. By speaking with a strong accent and using ungrammatical syntax, you can lead your listener to think that you are supporting a political view while discouraging them from pressing you for more information, because people generally avoid asking a lot of questions of someone whose utterances are difficult to understand. If there is confusion over what you had meant, you can later say you meant to convey something else!
To test the idea that L2 speakers get the benefit of the doubt, my team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology had people listen to poorly formed English sentences such as:
(1) The millionaire profited the tax reduction.
(2) The earthquake shattered from the house.
These sentences were spoken either in standard American English, or with a strong Israeli or Hindi accent. Note that each of these sentences is oddly constructed: either the grammar is wrong, or the speaker is saying something strange. In the first example, maybe the speaker meant ‘The millionaire profited from the tax reduction’ or ‘The tax reduction profited the millionaire’. In the second, maybe the speaker meant ‘The earthquake shattered the house’ or ‘The house was shattered from the earthquake’. Otherwise, they are saying that a house somehow destroyed an earthquake, which makes no sense.
After each sentence, we asked our participants to probe their interpretation of these strange sentences. The upshot: when sentences were spoken with an accent, listeners were more inclined to interpret them in the more plausible way, compared with when they were spoken in standard American English. When the sentences were spoken with no accent, listeners were more likely to interpret them literally and assume that the meaning was implausible.
We interpreted this result in terms of a noisy-channel model of language processing. In many situations, we are not sure exactly what our conversation partner said because the communication channel is noisy: speakers misspeak, listeners mishear, and noise in the environment can distort the speech signal. So we have to make guesses about what the speakers probably said, given what we think they wanted to convey. Sometimes our guesses are amusingly wrong, as in the report from January 2011 about a flood in Queensland in north-eastern Australia. The Morning Bulletin newspaper quoted a piggery owner saying that ‘more than 30,000 pigs were floating down the Dawson River since last weekend’. What was actually said was ‘30 sows and pigs’ but the sequence ‘30 thousand’ is much more likely than ‘30 sows and’, because ‘thousand’ is a word that often follows a numeral such as ‘30’, and ‘sows’ is very infrequent in most people’s experience. The reporter was relying on his knowledge of language statistics to interpret something unusual that he’d heard. But if the reporter had also paid attention to likely meanings (not just sequences of words), then he would have asked more questions or requested photos of this river full of pigs.
Applying the noisy-channel idea to understanding L2 speakers, we can think of the errors in non-native English as a noisier language model than a native-speaker model. Listeners expect more errors and are therefore more likely to think that L2 speakers mean something sensible when they say something implausible. But if a native speaker says something nonsensical, listeners are more likely to take them literally, because they know their language model has less noise.
Edward Gibson
This article was originally published at Aeon and has been republished under Creative Commons.
Question 1: What can be inferred from ‘the pig incident’ described in the passage?
a) When the channel becomes noisy, we often round things off to the closest thing that we know.
b) People often overlook the veracity of the statements made by non-native speakers.
c) When a native speaker makes a statement, people are inclined to take it literally and often overlook checking the plausibility of the statement.
d) People severely underestimate the vocabulary of non-native speakers and this leads to communication problems.
Instructions
Choose the most appropriate option to fill in the blanks.
Of the various theories advanced on the origin of the North American Indians, none has been so entirely satisfactory as to command a general (1); and on this point many and different opinions are yet held. The late De Witt Clinton, Governor of the State of New York, a man who had given no slight consideration to subjects of this nature, maintained that they were of Tatar (2); others have thought them the descendants of the Ten Tribes, or the offspring of the Canaanites expelled by Joshua. The opinion, however, most commonly entertained is, that the vast continent of North America was peopled from the Northeast of Asia; in proof of which it is urged that every peculiarity, whether in person or disposition, which characterises the Americans, bears some resemblance to the rude tribes scattered over the northeast of Asia, but almost none to the nations settled on the northern extremity of Europe. Robertson, however, gives a new phase to this question; from his authority we learn that, as early as the ninth century, the Norwegians discovered Greenland and planted colonies there. The communication with that country, after a long interruption, was renewed in the last century, and through Moravian missionaries, it is now (3) that the Esquimaux speak the same language as the Greenlanders, and that they are in every respect the same people. By this decisive fact, not only is the (4) of the Greenlanders with the Esquimaux established, but also the possibility of peopling America from the north of Europe demonstrated, and if of America, then of course of Newfoundland also, and thus it appears within the verge of possibility, that the original inhabitants of this Island may be descendants of Europeans, in fact merely a distinct tribe of the Esquimaux. At a meeting of the Philosophical Society held in England some few years ago, the subject of the Red Indians of Newfoundland was brought under discussion by Mr. Jukes, the gentleman who conducted the geological survey of this Island; and Dr. King, a name well-known among scientific men, gave it as his opinion, founded on historical evidence, going so far back as the period of Sebastian Cabot, that they were really an Esquimaux tribe. Others are of opinion, founded on some real or presumed affinity between the vocabulary of the one people with that of the other that the Indian tribes of North America and the original inhabitants of Newfoundland, called by themselves “Boeothicks,” and by Europeans “Red Indians,” are of the same (5).
The enquiry, however, into the mere origin of a people is one more curious in its nature than it is calculated to be useful, and failure in attempting to discover it need excite but little regret; but it is much to be lamented that the early history of the Boeothick is shrouded in such (6), that any attempt to penetrate it must be vain. All that we know of the tribe as it existed in past ages, is derived from tradition handed down to us chiefly through the Micmacs; and even from this source, doubtful and uncertain as such authority confessedly is, the amount of information conveyed to us is both scanty and (7). From such traditional facts we gather, that the Boeothicks were once a powerful and numerous tribe, like their neighbouring tribe the Micmacs, and that for a long period these tribes were on friendly terms and inhabited the western shores of Newfoundland in common, together with other parts of the Island as well as the Labrador, and this good understanding continued until sometime after the discovery of Newfoundland by Cabot; but it was at length violently interrupted by the Micmacs, who, to (8) themselves with the French, who at that time held the sway in these parts, and who had taken offence at some proceedings of the Boeothicks, slew two Red Indians with the intention of taking their heads, which they had (9) from the bodies, to the French. This wanton and unprovoked outrage was discovered by the Boeothicks, who gave no intimation of such discovery, but who, after consulting together, determined on revenge. They invited the Micmacs to a feast, and arranged their guests in such order that every Boeothick had a Micmac by his side; at a preconcerted signal every Boeothick slew his guest. War of course (10). Firearms were but little known to the Indians at that time, but they soon came into more general use among such tribes as continued to hold intercourse with Europeans. This circumstance gave the Micmacs an undisputed ascendancy over the Boeothicks, who were forced to betake themselves to the recesses of the interior and other parts of the Island, alarmed, as well they might be, at every report of the firelock. What may be the present feelings of the Red Indians, supposing any of the tribe to be yet living, towards the Micmacs we know not; but we do know that the latter cherish feelings of unmitigated hatred against the very name of “Red Indian.”
Question 2: (3)
a) prove
b) inundated
c) ascertained
d) submerged
e) disprove
Instructions
Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below
It would probably be difficult to point out any two words, respecting the proper use of which political economists have been more divided, than they have been concerning the two words “productive” and “unproductive”; whether considered as applied to “labour”, to “consumption”, or to “expenditure”.
Although this is a question solely of nomenclature, it is one of sufficient importance to be worth another attempt to settle it satisfactorily. For, although writers on political economy have not agreed in the ideas which they were accustomed to annex to these terms, the terms have generally been employed to denote ideas of very great importance, and it is impossible that some vagueness should not have been thrown upon the ideas themselves by looseness in the use of the words by which they are habitually designated. Further, so long as the pedantic objection to the introduction of new technical terms continues, accurate thinkers on moral and political subjects are limited to a very scanty vocabulary for the expression of their ideas. It therefore is of great importance that the words with which mankind are familiar, should be turned to the greatest possible advantage as instruments of thought; that one word should not be used as the sign of an idea which is already sufficiently expressed by another word; and that words which are required to denote ideas of great importance, should not be usurped for the expression of such as are comparatively insignificant.
The phrases “productive labour”, and “productive consumption”, have been employed by some writers on political economy with very great latitude. They have considered, and classed, as productive labour and productive consumption, all labour which serves any “useful” purpose – all consumption which is not “waste”. Mr. M’Culloch has asserted, “totidem verbis”, that the labour of Madame Pasta was as well entitled to be called productive labour as that of a cotton spinner.
Employed in this sense, the words “productive” and “unproductive” are superfluous, since the words “useful” and “agreeable” on the one hand, “useless” and “worthless” on the other, are quite sufficient to express all the ideas to which the words “productive” and “unproductive” are here applied.
This use of the terms, therefore, is subversive of the ends of language.
Those writers who have employed the words in a more limited sense, have usually understood by productive or unproductive labour, labour which is productive of wealth, or unproductive of wealth. But what is wealth? And here the words productive and unproductive have been affected with additional ambiguities, corresponding to the different extension which different writers have given to the term wealth.
Some have given the name of wealth to “all things” which tend to the use or enjoyment of mankind, and which possess exchangeable value. This last clause is added to exclude air, the light of the sun, and any other things which can be obtained in unlimited quantity without labour or sacrifice; together with all such things as, though produced by labour, are not held in sufficient general estimation to command any price in the market.
But when this definition came to be explained, many persons were disposed to interpret “all things” which tend to the use or enjoyment of man, as implying only all “material” things. “Immaterial” products they refused to consider as wealth; and labour or expenditure which yielded nothing but immaterial products, they characterised as unproductive labour and unproductive expenditure.
To this it was, or might have been, answered, that according to this classification, a carpenter’s labour at his trade is productive labour, but the same individual’s labour in learning his trade was unproductive labour. Yet it is obvious that, on both occasions, his labour tended exclusively to what is allowed to be production: the one was equally indispensable with the other, to the ultimate result. Further, if we adopted the above definition, we should be obliged to say that a nation whose artisans were twice as skilful as those of another nation, was not, “ceteris paribus”, more wealthy; although it is evident that every one of the results of wealth, and everything for the sake of which wealth is desired, would be possessed by the former country in a higher degree than by the latter.
Every classification according to which a basket of cherries, gathered and eaten the next minute, are called wealth, while that title is denied to the acquired skill of those who are acknowledged to be productive labourers, is a purely arbitrary division, and does not conduce to the ends for which classification and nomenclature are designed.
Question 3: Which of the following options is most likely to be the source of the passage?
a) An essay on nomenclature
b) A scientific journal
c) A book on political economy
d) A newspaper article
Question 4: According to the author, what is the correct definition of productive labour?
a) The author considers all labour which produces goods of exchangeable value as productive labour
b) The author considers all labour which serves a useful purpose as productive labour
c) The author considers labour which is productive of wealth, either material or non-material, as productive labour
d) The author does not state what he/she considers to be the correct definition of productive labour
Question 5: What is the author trying to convey through the last paragraph?
a) The author, through examples, is trying to make the point that wealth includes not just material things but also non-material things like skill and knowledge
b) The author, through examples, is trying to make the point that skills are more important measures of wealth than material things
c) The author, through examples, is trying to make the point that productive labour is labour that is not just productive of wealth but also productive of skill and knowledge
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d) The author is trying to explain how one nation with a greater number of skillful artisans will eventually end up wealthier than another nation with fewer skillful artisans
Question 6: According to the passage, why is it important to accurately define the terms productive and unproductive?
a) These terms help define extremely important ideas and any vagueness in their definition would, in turn, create ambiguity about the ideas they define
b) The vocabulary used to define ideas in political and moral subjects is limited and these two terms are used to define critical ideas
c) It is not important to accurately define these terms and these terms should not be used at all as their use is subversive of the ends of the language
d) They have been employed with great latitude by political economists as there is little consensus about their exact definition
Instructions
The highest priced words are ghost-written by gagmen who furnish the raw material for comedy over the air and on the screen. They have a word-lore all their own, which they practise for five to fifteen hundred dollars a week, or fifteen dollars a gag at piece rates. That’s sizable rate for confounding acrimony with matrimony, or extracting attar of roses from the other.
Quite apart from the dollar sign on it, gagmen’s word-lore is worth a close look, if you are given to the popular American pastime of playing with words — or if you’re part of the 40 per cent who make their living in the word trade. Gag writers’ tricks with words point up the fact that we have two distinct levels of language: familiar, ordinary words that everybody knows; and more elaborate words that don’t turn up so often, but many of which we need to know if we are to feel at home in listening and reading today.
To be sure gagmen play hob with the big words, making not sense but fun of them. They keep on confusing bigotry with bigamy, illiterate with illegitimate, monotony with monogamy, osculation with oscillation. They trade on the fact that for many of their listeners, these fancy terms linger in a twilight zone of meaning. It’s their deliberate intent to make everybody feel cozy at hearing big words, jumbled up or smacked down. After all, such words loom up over-size in ordinary talk, so no wonder they get the bulldozer treatment from the gagmen.
Their wrecking technique incidentally reveals our language as full of tricky words, some with 19 different meanings, others which sound alike but differ in sense. To ring good punning changes, gag writers have to know their way around in the language. They don’t get paid for ignorance, only for simulating it.
Their trade is a hard one, and they regard it as serious business. They never laugh at each other’s jokes; rarely at their own. Like comediennes, they are usually melancholy men in private life.
Fertile invention and ingenious fancy are required to clean up ‘blue’ burlesque gags for radio use. These shady gags are theoretically taboo on the air. However, a gag writer who can leave a faint trace of bluing when he launders the joke is all the more admired — and more highly paid. A gag that keeps the blue tinge is called a ‘double intender’, gag-land jargon for double entendre. The double meaning makes the joke funny at two levels. Children and other innocents hearing the crack for the first time take it literally, laughing at the surface humour; listeners who remember the original as they heard it in vaudeville or burlesque, laugh at the artfulness with which the blue tinge is disguised.
Another name for a double meaning of this sort is ‘insinuendo’. This is a portmanteau word or ‘combo’, as the gagmen would label it, thus abbreviating combination. By telescoping insinuation and innuendo, they get insinuendo, on the principle of blend words brought into vogue by Lewis Caroll. ‘Shock logic’ is another favourite with gag writers. Supposedly a speciality of women comediennes, it is illogical logic more easily illustrated than defined. A high school girl has to turn down a boy’s proposal, she writes:
Dear Jerry, I’m sorry, but I can’t get engaged to you. My mother thinks I am too young to be engaged and besides, I’m already engaged to another boy. Yours regretfully. Guess who.
Gag writers’ lingo is consistently funnier than their gags. It should interest the slang-fancier. And like much vivid jargon developed in specialised trades and sports, a few of the terms are making their way into general use. Gimmick, for instance, in the sense either of a trick devised or the point of a joke, is creeping into the vocabulary of columnists and feature writers.
Even apart from the trade lingo, gagmen’s manoeuvres are of real concern to anyone who follows words with a fully awakened interest. For the very fact that gag writers often use a long and unusual word as the hinge of a joke, or as a peg for situation comedy, tells us something quite significant: they are well aware of the limitations of the average vocabulary and are quite willing to cash in on its shortcomings.
When Fred Allens’ joke-smiths work out a fishing routine, they have Allen referring to the bait in his most arch and solemn tones: “I presume you mean the legless invertebrate.” This is the old minstrel trick, using a long fancy term, instead of calling a worm a worm. Chico Marx can stretch a pun over 500 feet of film, making it funnier all the time, as he did when he rendered, “Why a duck?”
And even the high-brow radio writers have taken advantage of gagmen’s technique. You might never expect to hear on the air such words as lepidopterist and entymologist. Both occur in a very famous radio play by Norman Corvine, ‘My client Curly’, about an unusual caterpillar which would dance to the tune ‘yes, sir, she’s my baby’ but remained inert to all other music. The dancing caterpillar was given a real New York buildup, which involved calling in the experts on butterflies and insects which travel under the learned names above. Corvine made mild fun of the fancy professional titles, at the same time explaining them unobtrusively.
There are many similar occasions where any one working with words can turn gagmen’s trade secrets to account. Just what words do they think outside the familiar range? How do they pick the words that they ‘kick around’? It is not hard to find out.
Question 7: Gag writers have influenced
a) television artistes.
b) radio writers.
c) circus clowns.
d) All of these
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Question 8: When the writer says, “They don’t get paid for ignorance, only for simulating it,” he means to say
a) the audience likes to think the gag writers are an ignorant lot.
b) gag writers are terrific with insinuations.
c) simulating ignorance is the trick that makes gag writers tick.
d) None of these
Question 9: In gag writers’ trade
a) long words are abbreviated for effect.
b) parts of words are combined to produce a hilarious portmanteau effect.
c) long words play a major role.
d) Both b and c
Question 10: According to the writer, gag writers thrive on
a) the double-layered aspect of language.
b) audience craze for double entendres.
c) vulgar innuendoes.
d) commonplace jugglery with language.
Question 11: According to the passage, the second level of language is important if
a) one wants to feel at home reading and listening today.
b) one wants to be a gag writer.
c) one wants to understand clean entertainment.
d) All of these
Question 12: The hallmark of gag writers is that they
a) ruin good, simple language.
b) have fun with words.
c) make better sense of words.
d) play with words to suit the audience’s requirements.
Question 13: According to the writer, a larger part of the American population
a) indulges in playing out the role of gag writers.
b) indulges in the word trade.
c) seeks employment in the gag trade for want of something better.
d) looks down on gag writers.
InstructionsDirections :In the following passage, you have one brief passage with 5 questions following the passage. Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives.
PASSAGE : Every profession or, trade, every art and every science has its technical vocabulary, the function of which is partly to designate things or processes which have no names in ordinary English and partly to secure greater exactness in nomenclature. Such special dialects or jargons are necessary in technical discussion of any kind. Being universally understood by the devotees of the particular science or art, they have the precision of a mathematical formula. Besides, they save time, for it is much more economical to name a process than to describe it. Thousands of these technical terms are very properly included in every large dictionary, yet, as a whole, they are rather on the outskirts of the English language than actually within its borders. Different occupations, however, differ widely in the character of their special vocabularies. In trades and handicrafts and other vocations like farming and fishing that have occupied great numbers of men from remote times, the technical vocabulary is very old. An average man now uses these in his own vocabulary. The special dialects of law, medicine, divinity and philosophy have become familiar to cultivated persons.
Question 14: It is true that
a) various professions and occupations often interchange words
b) there is always a non-technical word that may be substituted for the technical word
c) the average man often uses in his own vocabulary what was once technical language not meant for him
d) everyone is interested in scientific findings
Question 15: Special words used in technical discussion
a) may become part of common speech
b) never last long
c) should resemble mathematical formula
d) should be confined to scientific fields
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Question 16: From the given options, choose the one that completes the paragraph in the most appropriate way.The audiences for crosswords and sudoku, understandably, overlap greatly, but there are differences, too. A crossword attracts a more literary person, while sudoku appeals to a keenly logical mind. Some crossword enthusiasts turn up their noses at sudoku because they feel it lacks depth. A good crossword requires vocabulary, knowledge, mental flexibility and sometimes even a sense of humor to complete. It touches numerous areas of life and provides an “Aha!” or two along the way. _____ [CAT 2005]
a) Sudoku, on the other hand, is just a logical exercise, each one similar to the last.
b) Sudoku, incidentally, is growing faster in popularity than crosswords, even among the literati.
c) Sudoku, on the other hand, can be attempted and enjoyed even by children.
d) Sudoku, however, is not exciting in any sense of the term.
Question 17: From the given options, choose the one that completes the paragraph in the most appropriate way. The audiences for crosswords and sudoku, understandably, overlap greatly, but there are differences, too. A crossword attracts a more literary person, while sudoku appeals to a keenly logical mind. Some crossword enthusiasts turn up their noses at sudoku because they feel it lacks depth. A good crossword requires vocabulary, knowledge, mental flexibility and sometimes even a sense of humor to complete. It touches numerous areas of life and provides an “Aha!” or two along the way. _____
a) Sudoku, on the other hand, is just a logical exercise, each one similar to the last.
b) Sudoku, incidentally, is growing faster in popularity than crosswords, even among the literati.
c) Sudoku, on the other hand, can be attempted and enjoyed even by children.
d) Sudoku, however, is not exciting in any sense of the term.
Instructions
In each of the following questions five options are given, of which one word is most nearly the same or opposite in meaning to the given word in the question. Find the correct option having either same or opposite meaning.
Question 18: OSTRACIZE
a) espouse
b) blacklist
c) inimical
d) negligent
e) penurious
Answers & Solutions:
1) Answer (C)
In the paragraph that describes ‘the pig incident’, the journalist did not question the truthfulness of the statement. Though the figure quoted was too high to make sense, he failed to doubt the claim. Had the statement been made by a non-native speaker, the journalist would have assumed that the figure might be erroneous and questioned it further.
This goes on to show that people trust native speakers more and think that they (native speakers) know what they are talking about. Hence, option C is the right answer.
2) Answer (C)
Both the words “prove” and “ascertain” mean the same and fit in the blank. But the word “prove” is wrong in tense of the sentence. Thus the word “ascertained” is the correct fit.
3) Answer (C)
We can eliminate option A as the author is more concerned about the impact of the definition of the terms than about actual nomenclature itself. Similarly, it is unlikely that the passage is excerpted from a scientific journal or a newspaper article as neither is it related to scientific research nor does it cover any recent news or event. The passage discusses the impact of the definition of these terms on political subjects and mentions writers on the political economy. Hence, option C is the most likely alternative.
4) Answer (C)
The author clearly states that the use of productive labour in a more limited sense is the correct usage. In paragraph six, he/she states that productive labour is the labour that is productive of wealth. In the next few paragraph, he/she goes on to explain that wealth includes not just material goods but also non-material things like skills and knowledge. Option C, which captures all these points, is the right answer.
5) Answer (A)
The author disputes the “material” definition of wealth. According to her, the acquisition of skill and production of material goods both contribute to the wealth of a nation. Hence, the idea that best explains it is option A.
6) Answer (B)
The second paragraph states two reasons why these terms should be accurately defined. The first reason given is that these terms are used to explain important ideas and any vagueness in their definition would, in turn, impact the ideas they define. The second reason given is that there is academic opposition to the creation of new technical terms that can accurately describe these ideas. Option A mentions only the first point and hence is incomplete. Option B mentions both points and hence is the right answer.
7) Answer (B)
The answer can be concluded directly from the given lines:”This is the old minstrel trick, using a long fancy term, instead of calling a worm a worm. Chico Marx can stretch a pun over 500 feet of film, making it funnier all the time, as he did when he rendered, “Why a duck?” And even the high-brow radio writers have taken advantage of gagmen’s technique.”
8) Answer (C)
Refer to the following sentences: “To ring good punning changes, gag writers have to know their way around in a language. They don’t get paid for ignorance, only for simulating it”. So, the writer means to say that simulating ignorance is the trick that makes gag writers tick. Option c) is the correct answer.
9) Answer (D)
Refer to the following sentences: “This is a portmanteau word or ‘combo’…”, “For the very fact that gag writers often use a long and unusual word…”. From these sentences, we can infer that gag writers combine parts of words to produce a hilarious effect and that long words play a major role. So, option d) is the correct answer.
10) Answer (A)
Refer to the following lines:”Gag writers’ tricks with words point up the fact that we have two distinct levels of language: familiar, ordinary words that everybody knows; and more elaborate words that don’t turn up so often, but many of which we need to know if we are to feel at home in listening and reading today. To be sure gagmen play hob with the big words, making not sense but fun of them. They keep on confusing bigotry with bigamy, illiterate with illegitimate, monotony with monogamy, osculation with oscillation.” In this passage the author states that the gag writers make the use of double meaning language in order to make everyone feeling cozy.
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11) Answer (A)
This fact is highlighted when the author talks about the gag writers in two aspects of the language. Refer to the following lines:”Gag writers’ tricks with words point up the fact that we have two distinct levels of language: familiar, ordinary words that everybody knows; and more elaborate words that don’t turn up so often, but many of which we need to know if we are to feel at home in listening and reading today.” These line confirm option a as an answer.
12) Answer (B)
Throughout the passage, the author brings out various examples which show that the primary hallmark of a gag writer is that he/she has fun with words. Refer to the words ‘hilarious’, ‘joke’ etc. strewn throughout the passage. This is clearly brought out in option b).
13) Answer (B)
Refer to the following sentence: “Quite apart from the dollar sign on it,…word trade”. From this, we can understand that a large part of the American population indulges in word trade. Option b) is the correct answer.
14) Answer (C)
15) Answer (C)
16) Answer (A)
The last line of the paragraph should talk about Sudoku and the description should be in contrast to the description of Crossword. a) captures this the best way.
17) Answer (A)
The last line of the paragraph should talk about Sudoku and the description should be in contrast to the description of Crossword. a) captures this the best way.
18) Answer (B)
As per the Oxford dictionary, ostracize means ‘Exclude from society or group.’ ‘espouse’ means support a cause, a belief or a way of life, it does not go with the meaning of ‘ostracize’ , therefore option A is eliminated. ‘inimical’ means to obtruct or tend to harm something, which does align with the meaning of ‘ostracize’, so option C cannot be the answer as well .’negligent’ means something or someone who fails to take proper care of something, so the option D is also ruled out. ‘penurious’ means something or something which is extremely poor or poverty-stricken, which does not go with the meaning of the word ‘ostracize’ Therefore, blacklist is correct synonym here. Hence, correct option is B
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We hope this Vocabulary Words questions for SSC Stenographer will be highly useful for your preparation.
