Meiosis

A.Word.A.Day

with Anu Garg

meiosis

PRONUNCIATION:

(my-O-sis)

MEANING:

noun:
1. Understatement for rhetorical effect.
2. The process of cell division in which the number of chromosomes per cell is reduced to one half.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Greek meiosis (lessening), from meioun (to lessen), from meion (less).

NOTES:

Meiosis is a figure of speech in which underemphasis is used to achieve a greater effect, for example, "It took a few days to build the Great Wall of China." Also see litotes.

USAGE:

"At times I have a problem with this understatement. Understatement is effective only when there is real purpose to the meiosis."
James Gardner; Cold Mountain; National Review (New York); Dec 31, 1997.
"I took two years of biology in secondary school and couldn't today tell you the difference between meiosis and mitosis without a little help from Google, yet no one's arguing that studying cellular processes is a waste of precious school resources."
Kate Sommers-Dawes; Foreign Language in High Schools is Worthwhile; Washington Post; May 13, 2010.
Explore "meiosis" in the Visual Thesaurus.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY:

The souls of emperors and cobblers are cast in the same mold. The same reason that makes us wrangle with a neighbor creates a war betwixt princes. -Michel de Montaigne, essayist (1533-1592)