Make Your Point > Archived Issues > COMPENSATE

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pronounce COMPENSATE: Say it "KOM pun sate." To hear it, click here. connect this word to others: As you might recall, if you lived in ancient Rome and went shopping, you paid by placing your money on a scale. Hence, the Latin pendere means both "to weigh, to hang" and "to pay." This pendere shows up in our word compensate, along with many others, like spend, expensive, pending, depending, perpendicular, and the three words defined below: 1. To be pens___ is to be deep in thought, as if weighing ideas. 2. Literally "to pay out," to ___pense things is hand them out in sections, in an official way, as if you're in charge of the entire supply. 3. Literally "something weighed together," a compen____ is a shortened or summarized version of a longer piece of writing, or a handy or impressive collection or combination of things. (To reveal any word with blanks, give it a click.) definition: The Latin bits inside the word "compensate" literally mean "to weigh together," and less literally, "to swap in something of equal value." If I take something from you, but then I give you something that's just as good as what I took, I've paid you back: I've compensated you. Now we're even. If you give your employer your free time and your hard work, then your employer compensates you for those things by giving you a paycheck. If I borrow a leaf-blower from my neighbors and accidentally break it, then I compensate them for it by paying for a new one. To put that differently, to compensate someone for something is to give them something that's (hopefully) just as valuable as what you took. Here's another sense of the word. If I have some particular weakness, like a poor sense of direction, but then I develop some particular strength or habit to balance it out, like double-checking the directions and leaving extra-early to drive anywhere new, then I've made up for my weakness: I've compensated for it. Now I'm more or less "even" with people who have a good sense of direction. To put that differently, to compensate for something bad is to make up for it with something else that's (hopefully) just as good. grammatical bits: Part of speech: It's a verb, most often the transitive kind. You compensate a person: "They compensated him;" "They compensated her for the accident." Sometimes, it's the intransitive kind of verb. You can say that someone is compensating ("She's trying to compensate;" "He was able to compensate") or say that a good thing compensates for a bad thing ("This strength compensates for that weakness"). Other forms:  Compensated, compensating; compensation; compensator(s). For an adjective, you can pick from "compensational," "compensative," and "compensatory." how to use it: "Compensate" is a formal, serious word. It's very common. It tends to sound cold and businesslike when you use it to talk about money and payments, and it tends to sound analytical or technical when you use it to talk about people's strengths, weaknesses, and behaviors--or the strengths and weaknesses of devices, books, movies, companies, programs, etc. You might talk about companies or governments compensating people, often for their work or for their losses and suffering. And you might talk about people compensating for their weaknesses or shortcomings, either in a way that's effective ("His singing is weak, but his incredible skill on the guitar compensates for that") or not ("He's insecure about being short, so he compensates by being loud"). Finally, you might talk about certain advantages compensating for certain disadvantages. "The cozy atmosphere compensates for the limited menu." examples: "I strapped the life jacket to the base of the mast... It would provide extra flotation to compensate for the vertical weight of the mast."    — Yann Martel, Life of Pi, 2001 "She had never learned to read or write. She compensated for this handicap by developing a memory on which was indelibly stamped everything she had ever heard or seen or experienced."    — Ann Petry, Harriet Tubman: Conductor on the Underground Railroad, 1955 has this page helped you understand "compensate"? Awesome, I'm glad it helped! Thanks for letting me know! If you have any questions about this word, please message me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com. study it: Explain the meaning of "compensate" without saying "pay back" or "make up for." try it out: In Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, Barbara Ehrenreich demonstrates how difficult it is to survive on minimum wage. Something has to compensate for that low pay. She writes: "Too much of what we need, such as reliable child care, is just too expensive, even for middle-class families. Most civilized nations compensate for the inadequacy of wages by providing relatively generous public services such as health insurance, free or subsidized child care, subsidized housing, and effective public transportation. But the United States, for all its wealth, leaves its citizens to fend for themselves." Talk about the point she's making. How do some nations compensate workers for their low wages? How do other nations fail to compensate them? Do you have any experiences or observations that lead you to agree or disagree with her point? If you like, use this space to write. (To save your work, copy and paste it into an email or a document.) before you review, play: Try to spend 20 seconds or more on the game below. Don’t skip straight to the review—first, let your working memory empty out. Our game this month is "Codenames MYP." You can play it with a partner or by yourself. It's loosely based on the fantastic game Codenames Duet.   Check out the words in the grid. Ignore the colors; they're just the ones I had on hand.  If you’re playing with a partner, pick any 2 or 3 terms from the grid, and give your partner a one-word clue to help them guess your terms--without stumbling onto any that you didn't pick. Your partner can do the same for you. No hints! Just say your clue word and the number of terms it should point toward. If you're playing solo, try to guess 3 terms in the grid by using this clue: "horrifying." To see these answers, scroll all the way down. If you need any definitions, give these a click:       bulwark, caricature, vise,      shoehorn, triptych, chimera,      remora, doppelganger, abyss. review this word: 1. A near opposite of COMPENSATE could be A. ROB. B. PEER. C. ABANDON. 2. You're most likely to pair the adjective "compensating" with a noun like _____. A. "benefits," "advantages," or "virtues" B. "chaos," "confusion," or "pandemonium" C. "struggles," "clashes," or "undertakings" Answers to review questions: 1. A 2. A Answers to the game question: With the clue "horrifying," I was trying to point you toward chimera, doppelganger, and abyss. a final word: I hope you're enjoying Make Your Point. It's made with love. I'm Liesl Johnson, a reading and writing tutor on a mission to explore, illuminate, and celebrate words. From my blog: On vocabulary...       36 ways to study words.       Why we forget words, & how to remember them.       How to use sophisticated words without being awkward. On writing...       How to improve any sentence.       How to motivate our kids to write.       How to stop procrastinating and start writing.       How to bulk up your writing when you have to meet a word count. From my heart: a profound thanks to the generous patrons, donors, and sponsors that make it possible for me to write these emails. If you'd like to be a patron or a donor, please click here. If you'd like to be a sponsor and include your ad in an issue, please contact me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com. A disclaimer: When I write definitions, I use plain language and stick to the words' common, useful applications. If you're interested in authoritative and multiple definitions of words, I encourage you to check a dictionary. Also, because I'm American, I stick to American English when I share words' meanings, usage, and pronunciations; these elements sometimes vary across world Englishes.