Entry: militate (v.)
In context: "Jim'd told her later she'd seemed too conventionally, commercially pretty to consider using in any of that period's Work, part of whose theoretical project was to militate against received U.S. commercial-prettiness-conventions..."
Definition: To dispute, debate (a question); to contravene, to conflict with; to inhibit or prevent.
Other: I like these adjacent usages:
1857 J. Hyde Mormonism iv. 96 To hold no trust as sacred, no duty obligatory, no promise or oath binding that militates or infringes the interests of the Church.
1990 Marxism Today June 26/2 According to some journalists..there is less ‘caballing’ in today's newspaper office, and working conditions militate a sense of common interest, common identity and shared concerns among staff. Atomisation is the keyword here.
SNOOT score: 1
Page: 743
Source: Oxford English Dictionary
Definitive Jest is a vocabulary-building and SNOOT-approved word-of-the-day blog centered around David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest.
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