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Whether you're learning vocabulary in your native language or a foreign language, associations can help you memorize new words. Absurd, vivid, or ridiculous associations are the most likely to help you retain your new vocabulary. If you're learning a foreign language, associate new words with words in your native language. If a new word resembles a word in your native tongue, create a mental image association between the native word and the new word. For example, the French word "vin," or wine, sounds similar to the English word "van," so you might make a visual association of a van full of wine to help you remember. Word associations are also helpful if you're learning a new word in your own language. For example, the beginning of the word "curtail," which means to cut short, resembles the beginning of the word "curtain," so you can make a mental association of curtains cut too short to help you remember "curtail." When creating word associations, be sure to visualize the image vividly and to review it in your head several times a day so the association will become hardwired into your memory. A variation on the "similar word association" technique, mnemonic devices use patterns to assist your memory. For example, the word "abrogate," which means to deny or cancel, can be broken down into a pattern of images based on the series of letters that make up the word. So, you might break "abrogate" down into "a"+"bro"+"gate" and then visualize a bro standing at your gate while you "deny" him entrance. Like word associations, mnemonic techniques work best when they relate new concepts to concepts already in your knowledge base. It's often easier to remember unusual or bizarre things rather than banal ones, so get creative with your associations. For example, the term "banal" means "boring or everyday," so to help you remember its definition, you might picture a banana peel (because the beginning of "banal" resembles the beginning of "banana") floating in a canal (because "canal" rhymes with "banal"). A banana peel floating in a canal is a vivid enough image to remember, but it also captures an image of something banal, allowing you to associate "banal" with the definition "boring or uninteresting."
Create word associations. Use mnemonics. Be as creative as possible.