Contronym

Template:Short description Template:Redirect A contronym or contranym is a word with two opposite meanings. For example, the word original can mean "authentic, traditional", or "novel, never done before". This feature is also called enantiosemy,<ref>Template:Cite book, where "enantiosemy" is mentioned along with "auto-opposite",</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> enantionymy (enantio- means "opposite"), antilogy or autoantonymy. An enantiosemic term is by definition polysemic (having more than one meaning).

Nomenclature

A contronym is alternatively called an autantonym, auto-antonym, antagonym,<ref>Template:Cite Merriam-Webster</ref><ref name=":2">Template:Cite web</ref> enantiodrome, enantionym, Janus word (after the Roman god Janus, who is usually depicted with two faces),<ref name=":2"/> self-antonym, antilogy, or addad (Arabic, singular didd).<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Linguistic mechanisms

Denotations and connotations of words can drift or branch over centuries. An apocryphal story relates how Charles II (or sometimes Queen Anne) described St Paul's Cathedral (using contemporaneous English) as "Template:Lang", with the meaning (rendered in modern English) of "amazing, awe-inspiring, and artistic."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Examples

English

• Cleave can mean "to cling" or "to split apart".<ref name=":2"/><ref name=":0">Template:Cite web</ref>
• Clip can mean "attach" or "cut off".<ref name=":2" />
• Drop can mean "release or make available" (e.g., a music record) or "abandon or discontinue".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Dust can mean "to remove dust" (cleaning a house) or "to add dust" (e.g., to dust a cake with powdered sugar).<ref name=":2"/><ref name=":0" /> This contradiction features in the children's book Amelia Bedelia.<ref name="book">"Amelia Bedelia". LC Online Catalog. Library of Congress (lccn.loc.gov). Retrieved 2016-02-18.</ref>
• Fast can mean "without moving; fixed in place", (holding fast, also as in "steadfast"), or "moving quickly".<ref name=":2"/><ref name=":0" />
• Obbligato in music traditionally means a passage is "obligatory" but has also been used to mean "optional".<ref>"Obbligato" in Lectionary of Music, Nicolas Slonimsky. McGraw-Hill Template:ISBN</ref><ref>"Obbligato" in Collins Music Encyclopedia, Westrup & Harrison: Collins, London, 1959</ref>
• Overlook can mean "to make an accidental omission or error" or "to engage in close scrutiny or control".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Oversight can mean "accidental omission or error" or "close scrutiny or control".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Peruse can mean to "consider with attention and in detail" or "look over or through in a casual or cursory manner".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Ravel can mean "to separate" (e.g., threads in cloth) or "to entangle".<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Sanction can mean "to give approval" or "to impose a penalty upon".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Table can mean "to discuss a topic at a meeting" (British English) or "to postpone discussion of a topic" (American English). Canadian English uses both meanings of the word.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Other languages

Verbs

• The Romanian verb a închiria, the French verb louer, the Afrikaans verb huur, the Finnish verb vuokrata<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and the Spanish Template:Lang<ref name="Verne" /> and Template:Lang<ref name="Prieto">Template:Cite web</ref> mean "to rent" (as the lessee does) as well as "to let" (as the lessor does). The English verb Template:Wikt-lang can also describe either the lessee's or the lessor's role.
• In Spanish Template:Wikt-lang (basic meaning "to give"), when applied to lessons or subjects, can mean "to teach", "to take classes" or "to recite", depending on the context.<ref name="DRAE dar">Template:Cite book</ref> Similarly with the French verb apprendre, which usually means "to learn" but may refer to the action of teaching someone.<ref name="DRAE apprendre">Template:Cite book</ref> Dutch Template:Wikt-lang and Afrikaans Template:Wikt-lang can mean "to teach" or "to learn".
• In Greek some verbs that begin with the prefix "από-" (apo-) can have a contranym meaning. A prominent example is the verb "αποφράζω" means "to plug something, to fill a hole", and it usually used as a medical term, based on the original ancient Greek meaning. The more modern Greek meaning is "to unplug something, remove a blockage". Similar verbs are "απογεμίζω", that can both mean "to fill up to a brim" and "to empty completely" and "απομαθαίνω", that can both mean "to learn something very well" and "to forget something I learned". The meaning that negates the main action, is usually a more modern Greek one. The prefix "apo-" sometimes enhances an action and sometimes negates it.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Adverbs

• Template:Langx can mean "toward the sea" or "away from the sea" depending on dialect.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Template:Langx can mean "a while ago" or "in a little bit/later on"<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Adjectives

• The Latin sinister Template:Lit meant both "auspicious" and "inauspicious", within the respective Roman and Greek traditions of augury.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The negative meaning was carried on into French and ultimately English.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
• Latin Template:Wikt-lang means "excessive, too much". It maintained this meaning in Spanish Template:Wikt-lang, but it was also misinterpreted as "insignificant, without importance".<ref name="RAE nimio">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="Verne">Template:Cite web</ref>
• In Vietnamese, Template:Wikt-lang means among other things "bright, clear" (from Sino-Vietnamese Template:Lang) and "dead, gloomy" (from Template:Lang). Because of this, the name of the dwarf planet Pluto is not adapted from Template:Script as in Chinese, Japanese and Korean.<ref name="RenshawIhara2000">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="nineplan">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="Bathrobe">Template:Cite web</ref>
• Spanish Template:Wikt-lang meant originally "blissful, fortunate" as in Template:Lang, "fortunate land". However it developed an ironic and colloquial meaning "bothersome, unlucky", as in Template:Lang, "Damned flies!".<ref name="RAE dichoso">Template:Cite book</ref>

In translation

Seeming contronyms can arise from translation. In Hawaiian, for example, aloha is translated both as "hello" and as "goodbye", but the essential meaning of the word is "love", whether used as a greeting or farewell. Similarly, 안녕 (annyeong) in Korean can mean both "hello" and "goodbye" but the central meaning is "peace". The Italian greeting ciao is translated as "hello" or "goodbye" depending on the context; the original meaning was "at your service" (literally "(I'm your) slave").<ref>Ronnie Ferguson, A linguistic history of Venice, 2007, Template:Isbn, p. 284</ref>

See also

• X mark, which can either be synonymous or antonymous with a check mark in various contexts
• Īhām, ambiguity used as a literary device in Middle Eastern poetry
• -onym, suffix denoting a class of names
• Oxymoron, contradiction used as a figure of speech
• Semantics
• Skunked term, a term that becomes difficult to use because it is evolving from one meaning to another, or is otherwise controversial

Further reading

• Sheidlower, Jesse (1 November 2005). "The Word We Love To Hate". Slate.
• Leithauser, Brad (14 October 2013). "Unusable Words". The New Yorker.
• Herman, Judith B. (30 May 2014). "25 Words That Are Their Own Opposites". Mental Floss.
• Schulz, Kathryn (7 April 2015). What Part of "No, Totally" Don't You Understand?. The New Yorker.

External links

• Template:Wiktionary-inline
• Template:Wiktionary-inline
• Contronyms by language in Wiktionary
• Autoantonyms page on fun-with-words.com
• List of English examples at LingerAndLook.com