Page 182 - WEBSTER Essential vocabulary

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P – Q

palette (PAL it) n. 1. a thin board, usually with a thumbhole, on which an artist
mixes paint colors; 2. the colors used by a certain artist for a certain painting or
paintings
• An artist’s palette usually contains only the colors that he is using to make
a particular painting.
• During Picasso’s blue period, his palette was heavily tilted in the direction
of that color.
pallid (PAL id) adj. pale; wan; faint in color
• Margaret had been out of the sun for so long that her face had taken on an
unhealthy, pallid color.
[Syn. pale]
pantomime (PAN tuh MYM) vt. 1. a play or presentation wherein the charac-
ters perform actions and gesticulate, but speak no words; 2. an actor or actress who
performs in this way; 3. actions and gestures without words used as a means of
expression
• It is customary in Japanese Kabuki theater for characters to pantomime
while made up in whiteface.
• In Mel Brooks’s Silent Movie, everyone pantomimed except for the famous
mime Marcel Marceau, who spoke the only word.
• Pantomiming is a way of conveying information to one’s teammates in the
game of charades.
[-d, pantomiming]
paramount (PA ruh mownt) adj. ranking above all others; utmost; chief;
supreme
• A child’s education, both intellectually and socially, is of paramount impor-
tance to society.
• The meaning of what they say is not paramount for the French; rather, it’s
how they pronounce it.
[-ly adv.] [Syn. dominant]
parasite (PA ruh syt) n. 1. one who lives at the expense of others and con-
tributes nothing in return; 2. an organism that lives on or in another, getting nour-
ishment from the host but contributing nothing useful and sometimes causing
harm, for example, a leech
• Sometimes their maternal instincts cause women to take in parasites who
prey upon their better nature.
• Tapeworms are parasites that can live inside a person’s intestines and take
all the nourishment ingested for themselves.
[parasitic adj., parasitically adv.]

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