17-letter words containing s, i, n, u, o
- sanctimoniousness — making a hypocritical show of religious devotion, piety, righteousness, etc.: They resented his sanctimonious comments on immorality in America.
- sanctions-busting — the deliberate disregarding of sanctions that are in force against a state, organization, etc
- sandringham house — a residence of the royal family, in Sandringham, a village in E England, in Norfolk near the E shore of the Wash
- sandwich compound — any of a class of organometallic compounds whose molecules have a metal atom or ion bound between two plane parallel organic rings
- saturation diving — a method of prolonged diving, using an underwater habitat to allow divers to remain in the high-pressure environment of the ocean depths long enough for their body tissues to become saturated with the inert components of the pressurized gas mixture that they breathe: when this condition is reached, the amount of time required for decompression remains the same, whether the dive lasts a day, a week, or a month.
- sawatch mountains — range of the Rocky Mountains, in central Colo.: highest peak, Elbert
- scan-in, scan-out — scan design
- second lieutenant — an Army, Air Force, or Marine officer of the lowest commissioned rank. Compare ensign (def 4).
- secondary quality — one of the qualities attributed by the mind to an object perceived, such as color, temperature, or taste.
- self-constituting — to compose; form: mortar constituted of lime and sand.
- self-introduction — the act of introducing or the state of being introduced.
- self-purification — a natural process of purifying, as the ability of a body of water to rid itself of pollutants.
- self-renunciation — renunciation of one's own will, interests, etc.
- self-reproduction — the act or process of reproducing.
- self-rising flour — Self-rising flour is flour that makes cakes rise when they are cooked because it has chemicals added to it.
- selkirk mountains — a mountain range in SW Canada, in SE British Columbia. Highest peak: Mount Sir Sandford, 3533 m (11 590 ft)
- sensitivity group — a group of persons participating in sensitivity training.
- sexual generation — the gametophyte generation in the alternation of generations in plants that produces a zygote from male and female gametes.
- sheltered housing — accommodation designed esp for the elderly or infirm consisting of a group of individual premises, often with some shared facilities and a caretaker
- shirt-tail cousin — a distant cousin
- shouting distance — hailing distance.
- show in (or out) — to usher into (or out of) a given place
- sign in (or out) — to sign a register on arrival (or departure)
- silent revolution — a social or political revolution that takes place with little warning and without great fuss or unrest
- sinus of valsalva — any of the pouches of the aorta and the pulmonary artery opposite the flaps of the semilunar valves into which blood returning to the heart flows, closing the valves.
- situational irony — irony involving a situation in which actions have an effect that is opposite from what was intended, so that the outcome is contrary to what was expected.
- situations vacant — Situations Vacant is the title of a column or page in a newspaper where jobs are advertised.
- sixty-fourth note — a note having one sixty-fourth of the time value of a whole note; hemidemisemiquaver.
- skin of our teeth — a play (1942) by Thornton Wilder.
- smoothing circuit — a circuit used to remove ripple from the output of a direct current power supply
- snowmass mountain — a mountain in W central Colorado, in the Elk Mountains, in the S Rocky Mountains: ski resorts. 14,092 feet (4295 meters).
- social accounting — the analysis of the economy by sectors leading to the calculation and publication of economic statistics, such as gross national product and national income
- socially included — benefiting from social inclusion
- socratic elenchus — the drawing out of the consequences of a position in order to show them to be contrary to some accepted position
- sodium propionate — a transparent, crystalline, water-soluble powder, C 3 H 5 NaO 2 , used in foodstuffs to prevent mold growth, and in medicine as a fungicide.
- south farmingdale — a town on central Long Island, in SE New York.
- south frigid zone — the part of the earth's surface between the Antarctic Circle and the South Pole.
- south lanarkshire — a council area of S Scotland, comprising the S part of the historical county of Lanarkshire: included within Strathclyde Region from 1975 to 1996: has uplands in the S and part of the Glasgow conurbation in the N: mainly agricultural. Administrative centre: Hamilton. Pop: 303 010 (2003 est). Area: 1771 sq km (684 sq miles)
- south sea islands — the islands in the S Pacific that constitute Oceania
- southern rhodesia — a former name (until 1964) of Zimbabwe (def 1).
- southern studfish — See under studfish.
- southern triangle — the constellation Triangulum Australe.
- spatial summation — the act or process of summing.
- special education — education that is modified or particularized for those with singular needs, as disabled or maladjusted people, slow learners, or gifted children.
- sperrin mountains — a mountain range in NW Northern Ireland
- spot-illustration — a rounded mark or stain made by foreign matter, as mud, blood, paint, ink, etc.; a blot or speck.
- spread your wings — if you spread your wings, you do something new and rather difficult or move to a new place, because you feel more confident in your abilities than you used to and you want to gain wider experience
- squash vine borer — the larva of a clearwing moth, Melittia satyriniformis, that bores into the stems of squash and related plants.
- stand-up comedian — performer: tells jokes
- standard function — a subprogram provided by a translator that carries out a task, for example the computation of a mathematical function, such as sine, square root, etc