The GRE Verbal Reasoning Test: Warm-up Words: Warm-up, List 1

This list of warm-up words features common words on the test that you're probably familiar with. Brush up on these words first to make sure that you start off strong while taking the GRE.
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. appropriate
    take possession of by force
    How could they best appropriate the uncanny ability we kept to dream? The Marrow Thieves
  2. arrest
    cause to stop
    She’d all but forgotten the mural, and the sight arrested her: six dead gods, crudely blue and dripping red, and her father in the middle: hero, liberator, butcher. Strange the Dreamer
  3. cardinal
    serving as an essential component
    But as the weeks rolled on, he experienced firsthand the cardinal principle of American politics in the 1790s: whoever went face-to-face against Washington was destined to lose. Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation
  4. champion
    protect or fight for
    She thought of him coming to champion her, confident, unruffled, those wide dependable shoulders like a fortress between her and the angry face of Goodwife Cruff. The Witch of Blackbird Pond
  5. contend
    maintain or assert
    But even if, as Cannadine contends, “Speech was the very fibre of his being,” that’s not to say that it proceeded in any natural way from that being. Words Like Loaded Pistols
  6. convention
    something regarded as a normative example
    Programming, the installation of software, getting computers to speak properly to one another, all require very particular languages, protocols, and conventions—in sharp contrast to the emotional, visceral, manipulative drama of the political system. Geeks: How Two Lost Boys Rode the Internet Out of Idaho
  7. dismiss
    cease to consider
    He stepped into the darkness of the passage, dismissing the subject from his mind, and disappeared. The Once and Future King
  8. dupe
    fool or hoax
    As his reputation grew, Penn and Teller tried to coax him on to “Fool Us” and succeeded only after agreeing to let Wind perform without having to dupe the hosts. New York Times (Oct 20, 2022)
  9. guise
    an artful or simulated semblance
    “I am not as I seem. I wear this guise of madness for a purpose. I may put it on and take it off at will.” Ophelia
  10. intimate
    imply as a possibility
    Diana intimated that this would be a different parting from any they had ever yet known. Jane Eyre
  11. levee
    an embankment built to prevent a river from overflowing
    In his neighborhood, miles from the closest levee, the water had risen slowly enough that he knew it was unlikely that anyone had died in the flood. Zeitoun
  12. liberal
    given or giving freely
    Be liberal in your giving, realizing that the future generation must inherit great things, that they might know how close we lived to God. While the World Watched: A Birmingham Bombing Survivor Comes of Age during the Civil Rights Movement
  13. onomatopoeia
    using words that imitate the sound they denote
    Madden’s influence, steeped in Everyman sensibilities and studded with wild gesticulations and paroxysms of onomatopoeia — wham! doink! whoosh! — made the NFL more interesting, more relevant and more fun, for over 40 years. Seattle Times (Dec 31, 2021)
  14. profound
    far-reaching and thoroughgoing in effect
    With the nation’s economic depression growing ever more profound—banks failing, suicides multiplying—it seemed an impossibility. The Devil in the White City
  15. reproach
    express criticism towards
    “In those days,” he explained sheepishly to a former graduate student who reproached him for talking over his students’ heads, “I was just trying to educate myself.” Big Science
  16. resolution
    the trait of being firm in purpose or belief
    His demeanor had radiated an inner calm and resolution, as if he had finally made a decision he would never be able to go back on. The City Beautiful
  17. resolved
    firmly determined
    He rejoined the man about ten feet away and turned to see that any trace of the crying, helpless, I-want-to-quit Trina was gone, replaced with the firmly resolved woman Mark was used to seeing. The Kill Order (Maze Runner, Book Four; Origin)
  18. revere
    regard with feelings of respect
    In much the same way, the ancient Greeks revered their athletes and made statues of them in marble. Boy: Tales of a Childhood
  19. singular
    unusual or striking
    Another singular human trait is that we walk upright on two legs. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
  20. warrant
    show to be reasonable or provide adequate ground for
    If he continued to behave this way, he could easily spend the next five years in the lab without collecting sufficient data to warrant an honest Ph.D. Double Helix
Created on Wed Nov 30 12:52:25 EST 2022 (updated Thu Jan 12 14:58:44 EST 2023)

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