Chapter 2 — Vocabulary
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley — key words and definitions
Vocabulary Words from Chapter 2
- hypnopaedia (noun)
- The practice of learning during sleep, especially through the use of repeated audio messages played to a sleeping person.
- Pavlovian (adjective)
- Relating to or denoting classical conditioning as described by Ivan Pavlov, in which a neutral stimulus becomes associated with an involuntary response.
- conditioning (noun)
- The process of training or accustoming a person to behave in a certain way or to accept certain circumstances, especially through repeated exposure.
- visceral (adjective)
- Relating to deep inward feelings rather than to the intellect; instinctive and unreasoning.
- insidious (adjective)
- Proceeding in a gradual, subtle way, but with harmful effects; treacherous.
- inculcate (verb)
- To instill an attitude, idea, or habit by persistent instruction or repetition.
- decanting (noun)
- In the World State, the process of removing artificially gestated humans from their bottles — analogous to birth. Literally, pouring liquid from one container to another.
- caste (noun)
- A hereditary social class or system of rigid social stratification, here applied to the genetically engineered social hierarchy of the World State.
- aversion (noun)
- A strong feeling of dislike or disinclination; an intense desire to avoid something.
- totalizing (adjective)
- Encompassing or affecting all aspects of something; comprehensive and all-inclusive in scope.
- reverence (noun)
- Deep respect and admiration, often with a religious or worshipful quality.
- behaviorist (adjective)
- Relating to the school of psychology that focuses on observable behavior and environmental stimuli rather than internal mental states.
- detachment (noun)
- The state of being objective, aloof, or emotionally uninvolved.
- propagandist (adjective)
- Relating to the systematic dissemination of information or ideas designed to promote a particular cause or viewpoint, often in a biased or misleading way.
- self-referential (adjective)
- Referring to or directed toward itself; containing a reference to the thing that contains it.