I imagine that most people know what the word schadenfreude means: to take delight in the misfortune of others. This is a German word composed of schaden (“misfortune”) and freude (“joy”).[1] Sometimes it feels that posts in the political corners of social media mostly consist of one side or another expressing schadenfreude at the anguish of people on the other side. (For example, the #CryHarder hashtag on Twitter, if you can stand it.)
People occasionally ask whether there’s an English equivalent. Yes and no. It turns out that there is a term “in English,” which is to say, one that’s been composed out of classical roots. The word is epicaricacy, which combines Greek epi (“on”) and chara (“joy”) and kakon (“evil”). If you can find a definition—the word doesn’t appear in most dictionaries, not even in the OED—it’s glossed as “rejoicing at or deriving pleasure from the misfortunes of others.” In other words, schadenfreude.
The word showed up very occasionally, with a first mention cited from 1721 and another in 1955. It’s apparently become more popular in the 21st century. The Wikitionary entry suggests a kind of self-consciousness about that process: “there is little or no evidence of actual usage until it was picked up by various ‘interesting word’ websites.” People liked the word and have started using it. Given enough usage, the term will end up in the dictionary eventually.
I’d still push back on the idea that epicaricacy is the English word for schadenfreude. What even is an “English word,” anyway? A question for another time.
Late-breaking news: As I was writing this, I saw that Merriam-Webster has this very term (spelled epicharikaky) on Twitter today!
On to origins. I always thought of a valedictorian as the student who gives a speech at graduation ceremonies. Because this honor is often given to the top-performing student, many people (Americans?) think that this just refers to the best student in a class. I seem to recall some drama during the waning days of my senior year in high school about who would be valedictorian, and we ended up with “co-valedictorians.”
But no, the valedictorian isn’t about rank, it’s about the speech. The valedictorian delivers the valedictory address, i.e. the valediction, to their fellow students, which is a leave-taking or “farewell oration.” People familiar with liturgical vocabulary I’m sure know this very well.
Valediction comes from Latin valedicere, “to say farewell.” If you peer at the Latin word, you can make out vale to mean “well” and dicere to mean “say.” Related words in English are invalid (“not well, not strong”) and diction.
Depending on how generously one wants to interpret the idea of taking leave or bidding farewell, saying “bye-bye” might constitute a valediction. I’m sure many a high school student has wished during the ceremony that the valedictorian had reduced their speech to just “Hello, fellow students. My solemn duty today is to say goodbye. Thank you.” Heh.
Like this? Read all the Friday words.
[1] Once or twice I’ve heard that because German has a word for it, Germans must be uniquely subject to this emotion. This of course is patently horseshit. [^]