Word of the day: doyen

The word of the day is doyen:

< French doyen < Latin decān-usdean n.¹ In sense 1 from Old French; in sense 2 anew from mod. French.

1. A leader or commander of ten. Obs.

2. The senior member of a body. = dean n.¹  (OED)

"It may strike some viewers that the series’ juxtapositioning of the personal and the political trivializes history. A scene in which Rose, the doyenne of disapproval, is one-upping the new mother Jackie (Katie Holmes)—“I had all my children at home, as you know”—gives way to Bobby (Barry Pepper) bowing to his father’s will in agreeing to become attorney general, then cuts to the Bay of Pigs fiasco, then to a conversation between Bobby and J. Edgar Hoover (Enrico Colantoni), and then comes back to Rose instructing Jackie to learn to overlook her husband’s womanizing."

 - Nancy Franklin, "Glory Days: An American dynasty up close, in 'The Kennedys'", 4 April 2011 The New Yorker


EDIT:  Now that I'm looking back over this, now what I'm mostly struck by is the use of the word "juxtapositioning": wouldn't either "juxtaposing" or "juxtaposition" have been a better choice?