MacGuffin (en)

an object or device in a movie or a book that serves merely as a trigger for the plot; popularised as a term by Alfred Hitchcock

machicolation (en)

(noun) an opening between the corbels of a projecting parapet or in the floor of a gallery or roof of a portal for discharging missiles upon assailants below / (noun) a gallery or parapet containing such openings / (noun) construction imitating medieval machicolation

macramé (en)

the art of knotting cord or string in patterns to make decorative articles

macula (en)

(noun) an oval-shaped pigmented area near the center of the retina of the human eye and some other animalian eyes; provides the best detailed vision

madrigal (en)

(noun) a medieval short lyrical poem in a strict poetic form / (noun) a complex polyphonic unaccompanied vocal piece on a secular text developed especially in the 16th and 17th centuries / (noun) part-song / (noun) glee

maieutics (en)

relating to or resembling the Socratic method of eliciting new ideas from another

malediction (en)

(noun) curse execration

malefic (en)

(adjective) having malignant influence; baleful / (adjective) malicious

Mammon (en)

(noun) material wealth or possessions especially as having a debasing influence (from the New Testament)

mandarin (en)

(noun) historically, a high government bureaucrat of the Chinese Empire OR a pedantic or elitist bureaucrat OR senior person of influence in academia or literary circles / (adj) deliberately superior or complex; esoteric, highbrow, obscurantist

mandatary (en)

(noun) a person or state receiving a mandate

mandorla (en)

a pointed oval figure used as an architectural feature and as an aureole enclosing figures such as Jesus Christ or the Virgin Mary in medieval art

Manichaeism (en)

an ancient religious movement that has to do with duality? "an elaborate dualistic cosmology describing the struggle between a good, spiritual world of light, and an evil, material world of darkness"

manse (en)

the house occupied by a minister of a Presbyterian church OR an informal way of referring to someone's house

manumission (en)

(noun) the act or process of manumitting / (noun) formal emancipation from slavery

Marktvolk (de)

a neologism coined by Wolfgang Streeck in Buying Time, and defined as "the people of the market"; in contrast to the Staatsvolk, with their diffuse and politically expandable civil rights, Marktvolk have claims on the state that are in principle enforceable before a court of law and come to an end with the fulfilment of the relevant contract

marmoreal (en)

(adjective) of, relating to, or suggestive of marble or a marble statue especially in coldness or aloofness

Marquis de Sade (en)

a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer, famous for his libertine sexuality

Marxian (en)

pertaining to Karl Marx and ideas he explicitly explored in his writings; differs from Marxist in that the latter includes ideas developed by others in the same vein of thought

Marxist (en)

relating to or denoting the political and economic theories of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels (noun or adj)

massif (en)

(from French for "massive") large mountain mass

master signifier (en)

a Lacanian term (following the linguistics of Saussure); really just another signifier (i.e., something that organises discursive structures) but one which stops the slippage of the signified under the signifier and fixes meaning, thereby forming a stable symbolic order. i don't really know tbh. a platonic ideal of a concept like "freedom" or "health"?

materielle Rationalität (en)

material or substantive rationality (coined by sociologist Max Weber)

mathematical platonism (en)

the metaphysical view that there are abstract mathematical objects whose existence is independent of us and our language, thought, and practices

matutinal (en)

(adjective) of, relating to, or occurring in the morning; early