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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/38038
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

When reading (especially when younger) it is common to come across a word you have never seen before, some of these words you'll need a dictionary for, but sometimes this isn't the case.

Let me give an example using cutease.

> she cuteased the panda.

makes no sense if you don't know the word.

> She playfully cuteased the panda, giggling while calling it plump and joyfully calling it a pirate bear due to the distinctive black eye markings, even though she knew the panda couldn't understand, sometimes she could swear that pirate bear did understand she was only having fun and that he could tell her jokes came from her love of him.

The reader might not be able to produce a definition for the word after reading that. but it allows a reader invested in the story to gloss over the word still knowing whats happening without interrupting the flow too much.

This is not for everyone, some people just cannot stand literature that uses words they don't know, but as long as they are used sparingly and given a healthy dose of context people will learn words, just as you probably did when learning to read/speak picking up on them from context not studying a dictionary.

Original score: 3