This week’s theme
There’s a word for it

This week’s words
cacoethes
refoulement
memetic
bimarian
graphomania

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A.Word.A.Day

PRONUNCIATION:

(ruh-FUL-man) [the last syllable is nasal]

MEANING:

noun: The forcing of refugees or asylum seekers to return to a place where they are likely to face persecution.

ETYMOLOGY:

From French refoulement (turning back), from refouler (to push back), from re- (again) fouler (to trample). Earliest documented use: 1780.

NOTES:

Originally the term refoulement referred to the overflowing of a river or of the water being dammed back due to the accumulation of ice. Today, non-refoulement is a principle of international law prohibiting turning away refugees and asylum seekers to a place they are fleeing from.

USAGE:

“[Jennifer] Harbury, who is sixty-six, has made a career of challenging alleged abuses of immigrants, including refoulements. She grew up in Connecticut and California, in a family that had fled Nazi persecution in Holland during the Second World War.”
Sarah Stillman; No Refuge; The New Yorker; Jan 15, 2018.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: