WORD of the day

amok \uh-MUHK\, adjective:

1. In or into a jumbled or confused state.
2. In or into an uncontrolled state or a state of extreme activity.
3. In a frenzy to do violence or kill.

noun:
1. A psychic disturbance characterized by depression followed by a manic urge to murder.
There's a legend that when the Lumiere brothers - pioneers of motion pictures - showed their film of an approaching train in 1896, the audience ran amok in terror.
-- Claire O'Neill, "Autochromes: The First Flash Of Color", NPR
With fiscal affairs amok, North Dakota higher education is experiencing its third major scandal since statehood.
-- Lloyd Omdahl, "Omdahl: Restraint the best recipe", Inforum

Amok enters English from the Malay amuk, "attacking furiously." The word was adopted into Portugese as amouco.