Definition: noun 1: a verbal noun in Latin that expresses generalized or uncompleted action 2: any of several linguistic forms analogous to the Latin gerund in languages other than Latin; especially : the English verbal noun ending in -ing that has the function of a substantive and at the same time shows the verbal features of tense, voice, and capacity to take adverbial qualifiers and to govern objects

Etymology: Late Latin gerundium, from Latin gerundus, gerundive of gerere to bear, carry on

Quotation:

The law professor Alan Dershowitz, in a Boston Globe op-ed column critical of the rough interrogation method, put the two words together as a verbal noun or gerund. Soon after, Senator John McCain — no stranger to both the wrong of painful coercion and the need for antiterror intelligence — strongly denounced the procedure as “exquisite torture.”

- William Safire on the formation of the word “waterboarding” in his On Language column in the New York Times Magazine

I always get this word mixed up with another word that deals with grammar and language…although I can’t for the life of me think of what that word is right now. If I do, you can be sure it will show up in a future WOTD post.