It's Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for May 13th.
Today's word is instigate, spelled I-N-S-T-I-G-A-T-E.
Instigate is a verb.
To instigate something is to cause it to happen or begin.
Here's the word used in a sentence from The Independent of London by Mark Beaumont.
The image of John Paul,
George and Ringo waving from the top steps of Pan Am Yankee Clipper Flight 101 at 1.20 p.m. on the 7th of February 1964 is among the most iconic in rock and roll history.
That airplane steps photo was pivotal in instigating a dynamic in rock music whereby boys played guitars to the wild adulation of girls,
a misguided social norm that became so deeply embedded in the music industry that we're only now beginning to untangle it.
It's time to investigate the true meaning of the word instigate.
Instigate is often used as a synonym of the word in sight,
I-N-C-I-T-E, as in, siblings instigating a fight.
But the two words differ slightly in their overall usage.
Insight usually stresses an act of stirring something up that one did not necessarily initiate,
as in the court's decision incited riots.
While instigate implies responsibility for initiating or encouraging someone else's action,
and usually suggests dubious or underhanded intent,
as in he was charged with instigating a conspiracy.
Coming from a form of the Latin verb instigare, meaning to urge on or provoke,
instigate stepped into English in the 1500s, roughly a century after the word in sight.