The word desiccated has appeared 26 times on NYTimes.com in the past year, including on July 15 in The New York Times article “I Put Up a Fence in Maine. Why Did It Cause Such a Fuss?” by Heidi Julavits. She writes about living in a house that includes “the magazine room,” a small space with walls adorned with clippings from fashion, adventure-story and homemaking magazines from the early 1900s, apparently placed there many years ago:
The uninsulated space heats up these days to what must be over 100 degrees during the summer, and for that reason I tend not to go there, and so was surprised to find, while we were supposedly preserving it, that the magazine room is in ruins. The glue is decomposing; the desiccated clippings, when touched, turn to dust. Someday, the walls will be bare.
Daily Word Challenge
Can you correctly use the word desiccated in a sentence?
Based on the definition and example provided, write a sentence using today’s Word of the Day and share it as a comment on this article. It is most important that your sentence makes sense and demonstrates that you understand the word’s definition, but we also encourage you to be creative and have fun.
If you want a better idea of how desiccated can be used in a sentence, read these usage examples on Vocabulary.com. You can also visit this guide to learn how to use IPA symbols to show how different words are pronounced.
If you enjoy this daily challenge, try our vocabulary quizzes.
Students ages 13 and older in the United States and the United Kingdom, and 16 and older elsewhere, can comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff.
The Word of the Day is provided by Vocabulary.com. Learn more and see usage examples across a range of subjects in the Vocabulary.com Dictionary. See every Word of the Day in this column.
