jacquerie (en)

a communal uprising or revolt; named after a popular revolt by peasants that took place in northern France in the early summer of 1358 during the Hundred Years' War (which was itself named after the "jacque", or tunic, that the peasants wore)

jalopies (en)

an old car in a dilapidated condition

jalousies (en)

(noun) a blind with adjustable horizontal slats for admitting light and air while excluding direct sun and rain / (noun) a window made of adjustable glass louvers that control ventilation

jamboree (en)

a large celebration or party, typically a lavish and boisterous one

janissary (en)

(noun) a member of the Turkish infantry forming the Sultan's guard between the 14th and 19th centuries

jejune (en)

(adjective) lacking nutritive value / devoid of significance or interest; dull / naive, simplistic, and superficial

jeremiad (en)

(noun) a long, mournful complaint or lamentation; a list of woes

jeroboam (en)

(noun) an oversize wine bottle holding about three liters

Jetztzeit (de)

present time (compound of jetzt "now" + Zeit "time"); a term coined by Walter Benjamin

Jevonian revolution (en)

named after William Stanley Jevons, though referring to a shift in economic thought to which many contributed; switch from a focus to class-based analysis to using individual consumers as the basis

jihad (en)

(noun) a holy war waged on behalf of Islam as a religious duty / (noun) a personal struggle in devotion to Islam especially involving spiritual discipline / (noun) a crusade for a principle or belief

joists (en)

lengths of timber or steel supporting part of the structure of a building, typically arranged in parallel series to support a floor or ceiling

jongleur (en)

an itinerant minstrel

Jorge Luis Borges (en)

Argentine writer most famous for his map/territory story

joss (en)

(noun) a Chinese idol or cult image / (noun) a Chinese temple or shrine / (noun) a slender stick of incense burned in front of a joss

jouissance (fr)

physical or intellectual pleasure, delight, or ecstasy; the concept featured heavily in the psychoanalysis of Jacques Lacan's and was expanded on by Roland Barthes for literary theory, to contrast with mere "pleasure" derived from reading texts that don't challenge the reader as a subject. can also refer to pleasure that devolves into pain

juridical (en)

relating to judicial proceedings and the administration of the law

juvenescence (en)

youth

Kabbalah (en)

the ancient Jewish tradition of mystical interpretation of the Bible; as an adjective, refers to something secretive or mysterious

Kadarization (en)

a reference to Janos Kadar, a Hungarian communist leader who assumed power in 1956 with the putative support but not the trust of the Soviet Union (I think)

kallocratic (en)

rule by beauty (from Greek kallos)

karstic (en)

(noun) an irregular limestone region with sinkholes, underground streams, and caverns

keister (en)

(North American) buttocks

Kekulian (en)

(adj) relating to German organic chemist Friedrich August Kekulé, who discovered the structure of benzene in an Friedrich ouroboros-themed dream

keller (en)

basement