- soi-disant
- adj. self-styled; so-called
This wonderfully pretentious French adjective is basically a drop-in replacement for the phrase “so-called,” and seems to retain its connotations of sarcasm, too. For instance, if I were to brag about my knowledge and philology and language, you might snort and say that I am a “soi-disant linguist,” meaning that I am not a linguist but instead full of shit1. The phrase is an almost-literal translation of the French oneself-saying, and pronounced “swah dee zahn.”
- From the Old English scÄ«tan.[↩]