Site of the Day for Thursday, October 7, 2021
25 Words That Are Their Own Opposites
Today's site from Mental Floss offers another of the endlessly quirky aspects
of English -- the contronym, a term which frequently triggers a spell check
error. Knowledgeable Gentle Subscribers, however, will be aware that this
perfectly valid, albeit it slightly obscure word, denotes the peculiar ability
of some words to contain meanings which include the antonym of that meaning.
"Here's an ambiguous sentence for you: 'Because of the agency's oversight, the
corporation's behavior was sanctioned.' Does that mean, 'Because the agency
oversaw the company's behavior, they imposed a penalty for some transgression,'
or does it mean, 'Because the agency was inattentive, they overlooked the
misbehavior and gave it their approval by default'? We've stumbled into the
looking-glass world of contronyms -- words that are their own antonyms." - from
the website
Native English speakers may not have given this language idiosyncrasy much
thought but for those learning English as a second language, it might cause
them to throw in the towel. A number of the words which fall into this category
find their origins to be centuries in the past when various invasions of the
British Isles caused an influx of new terms to be added to the vernacular --
sanction, trim, and flog, for example. Each contronym is used in sentences
conveying each of their opposing meanings, many with their background origins.
A tip of the hat to Subscriber DC for this suggestion.
Skip over to the site to revel in yet another English language peculiarity at:
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/57032/2ir-own-opposites
A.M. Holm
Comments? Suggestions? amholm@xxxxxxxxxxx
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