tousle

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for April 20, 2010 is: tousle • \TOW-zul\  • verb : dishevel, rumple Examples: Vic stood in front of the mirror and tousled his hair, trying to master the cool, disheveled look. Did you know? "Tousle" is a word that has been through what linguists call a "functional shift." That's a fancy way of saying it was originally one part of speech, then gradually came to have an additional function. "Tousle" started out as a verb back in the 15th century. By the late 19th century, "tousle" was also being used as a noun meaning "a tangled mass (as of hair)." Etymologists connect the word to an Old High German word meaning "to pull to pieces." See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.