IELTS Vocabulary – Part 120

Smugness: excessive pride in oneself or one’s achievements; self-satisfied.

Sentence – The endearing bathos and crassness of Laurel found an admirable foil in the elephantine smugness of his rotund partner.

Culpable: deserving blame; guilty; fault.

Sentence – At the same time, the culpable faction is viewed as exempt from organizational control.

Pillory: attack or ridicule publicly; criticize.

Sentence – Meanwhile, the transformation from pillory to drama incarnates the intention transformation of watch. Thus, it reflects some kind of mood of the writer and the society.

Hustings: a meeting at which candidates an election address potential voters

Sentence – Most candidates will be out on the hustings this week.

Appalling: Something that is appalling is awful or horrible, causing dismay or disgust; very bad.

Sentence – Aid workers were said to have been filled with dismay by the appalling conditions that the refugees were living in.

Shabby: (of behavior) mean and unfair; dishonorable; disreputable.

Sentence – The hotel looked shabby from the street, but it was fine on the inside.

Dubious: hesitating or doubting.

Sentence – They indulged in some highly dubious business practices to obtain their current position in the market.

Reluctant: unwilling and hesitant; disinclined.

Sentence – Children are sometimes understandably reluctant to wear glasses that are ugly or uncomfortable.

Homicides: the killing of one person by another.

Sentence – Most homicides were unplanned, and few brought any benefit to the offender even if he avoided punishment.

standardization – is the process of implementing and developing technical standards.

Sentence- The benefits of standardization are coupled with the capacity to respond to change-a way to have your cake and eat it too.

national sovereignty – the idea that independent nations, which have declared their independence, have an organized government and are self-contained, have a right to exist without other nations interfering

Sentence- In another place , pilotage relates with national sovereignty and national defence confidential.

to accelerate – cause (something) to happen sooner or more quickly;

Sentence- They use special chemicals to accelerate the growth of crops.

affluence – abundance of property;

Sentence- Furthermore, the same affluence encourages an increased array of leisure time activity choices.

to dominate – to have control of or power over (someone or something);

Sentence- Price tends to dominate all other considerations.

superpower – an extremely powerful nation;

Sentence- The United States could claim to be both a military and an economic superpower.

imbalance / inequality – a state or condition in which different things do not occur in equal or proper amounts;

Sentence- The current trade deficit indicates a serious imbalance between our import and export trade.