"Enantiodrome" redirects here. For the Jungian principle of equilibrium, see Enantiodromia.
An auto-antonym or autantonym, also called a contronym[1] or antagonym among other terms, is a word with multiple meanings (senses) of which one is the reverse of another. For example, the word cleave can mean "to cut apart" or "to bind together". This phenomenon is called enantiosemy,[2][3]enantionymy (enantio- means "opposite"), antilogy or autantonymy. An enantiosemic term is necessarily polysemic.
An auto-antonym is alternatively called an antagonym, contronym, contranym, enantiodrome, enantionym, Janus word (after the Roman god Janus, who is usually depicted with two faces),[1]self-antonym, antilogy, or addad (Arabic, singular didd).[4][5]
Some pairs of contronyms are true homographs, i.e., distinct words with different etymology which happen to have the same form. For instance cleave "separate" is from Old Englishclēofan, while cleave "adhere" is from Old English clifian, which was pronounced differently.
Other contronyms are a form of polysemy, but where a single word acquires different and ultimately opposite definitions. For example, sanction—"permit" or "penalize"; bolt (originally from crossbows)—"leave quickly" or "fix/immobilize"; fast—"moving rapidly" or "unmoving". Some English examples result from nouns being verbed in the patterns of "add <noun> to" and "remove <noun> from"; e.g. dust, seed, stone. Denotations and connotations 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 "awful, pompous, and artificial," with the meaning (rendered in modern English) of "awe-inspiring, majestic, and ingeniously designed".[6] Negative words such as bad[7] and sick sometimes acquire ironic senses referring to traits that are impressive and admired, if not necessarily positive (that outfit is bad as hell; lyrics full of sick burns).
Some contronyms result from differences in varieties of English. For example, to table a bill means "to put it up for debate" in British English, while it means "to remove it from debate" in American English (where British English would have "shelve", which in this sense has an identical meaning in American English). To barrack, in Australian English, is to loudly demonstrate support, while in British English it is to express disapproval and contempt.
Some words contain simultaneous opposing or competing meanings in the same context, rather than alternative meanings in different contexts; examples include blend words such as coopetition (meaning a murky blend of cooperation and competition), frenemy (meaning a murky blend of friend and enemy), glocalization, etc. These are not usually classed as contronyms, but they share the theme of containing opposing meanings.
In Latin, sacer has the double meaning "sacred, holy" and "accursed, infamous". Greek δημιουργός gave Latin its demiurgus, from which English got its demiurge, which can refer either to God as the creator or to the devil, depending on philosophical context.
In some languages, a word stem associated with a single event may treat the action of that event as unitary, so in translation it may appear contronymic. For example, Latin hospes can be translated as both "guest" and "host". In some varieties of English, borrow may mean both "borrow" and "lend".
Examples
English
Cleave can mean "to cling" or "to split apart".[1][8]
Dust can mean "to remove dust” (cleaning a house) or "to add dust" (e.g., to dust a cake with powdered sugar).[1][8]
Fast can mean "without moving; fixed in place", (holding fast, also as in "steadfast"), or "moving quickly".[1][8]
Obbligato in music can refer to a passage that is either "obligatory" or "optional".[9]
Oversight can mean "accidental omission or error", or "close scrutiny and control".
Peruse can mean to "consider with attention and in detail" or "look over or through in a casual or cursory manner".[10][11]
Ravel can mean "to separate" (e.g., threads in cloth) or "to entangle".[12]
Sanction can mean "approve" or "penalize".
Table can mean "to discuss a topic at a meeting" (British English) or "to postpone discussion of a topic" (American English).[13]
Other languages
Nouns
The Korean noun 앞(ap) may mean either "future" or "past" (distinguished by context).
Verbs
The German verb ausleihen, the Dutch verb lenen, the Polish verb pożyczyć, the Russian verb одолжить (odolžítʹ), the Finnish verb lainata, and the Esperanto verb prunti can mean either "to lend" or "to borrow", with case, pronouns, and mention of persons making the sense clear. The verb stem conveys that "a lending-and-borrowing event is occurring", and the other cues convey who is lending to whom. This makes sense because anytime lending is occurring, borrowing is simultaneously occurring; one cannot happen without the other.
The Romanian verb a închiria, the French verb louer, and the Finnish verb vuokrata[14] mean "to rent" (as the lessee does) as well as "to let" (as the lessor does).
The Swahili verb kutoa means both "to remove" and "to add".
The Chinese word "大败", it means both "be defeated" and "to defeat".
The Persian verb چیدن (čidan) means both "to pluck" and "to arrange" (i.e. by putting objects down).
In Spanish dar (basic meaning "to give"), when applied to lessons or subjects, can mean "to teach", "to take classes" or "to recite", depending on the context.[15]
The Indonesian verb menghiraukan and mengacuhkan can mean "to regard" or "to ignore".
The Indonesian/Malay adjective usah can mean "required" or "discouraged".
Adverbs
Hindi: कल and Urdu: کل (kal[kəl]) may mean either "yesterday" or "tomorrow" (disambiguated by the verb in the sentence).
Irish: ar ball can mean both "a while ago" and "in a little bit/later on"[16]
Agent nouns
The Italian, Spanish and Frenchcognates, ospite, huésped and hôte, respectively, also can mean "host" or "guest". The three words derive from the Latinhospes, which also carries both meanings.
Adjectives
The Latinsinister lit.'left' meant both "auspicious" and "inauspicious", within the respective Roman and Greek traditions of augury.[17] The negative meaning was carried on into French and ultimately English.[18]
Latin nimius means "excessive, too much". It maintained this meaning in Spanish nimio, but it was also misinterpreted as "insignificant, without importance".[19]
minh means among other things "bright, clear" (from Sino-Vietnamese明) and "dead, gloomy" (from 冥). Because of this, the name of the dwarf planet Pluto is not adapted from 冥王星 as in Chinese, Japanese and Korean.[20][21][22]
In translation
Seeming auto-antonyms can occur 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. 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").[23]
^Liberman, Anatoly (25 September 2013). "Etymology gleanings for September 2013". Oxford Etymologist. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 25 September 2013. The coexistence of two opposite meanings in a word is called enantiosemy, and the examples are rather numerous.
^"'Addad' : a study of homo-polysemous opposites in Arabic". Retrieved 2 August 2011.
^Gall, Nick. "Antagonyms". Retrieved 2 August 2011.
^O’Toole, Garson (31 October 2012). "St Paul's Cathedral Is Amusing, Awful, and Artificial". Quote Investigator. Retrieved 22 January 2015.
^"Definition of PERUSE". www.merriam-webster.com. Retrieved 28 June 2020. to ... EFFECT
^"Janus Words". www.merriam-webster.com. Retrieved 28 June 2020. to ... EFFECT
^The Canadian Oxford dictionary (2nd ed.). Oxford University Press. 2004. p. 1283. ISBN9780195418163. entangle...disentangle, unravel
^Barber, Katherine, ed. (2004). Canadian Oxford Dictionary (Second ed.). Don Mills, Ontario: Oxford University Press Canada. p. 1580. ISBN9780195418163.
^"sanakirja.org". from the original on 2021-11-26.
^"dar". Diccionario de la lengua española (in Spanish) (23 ed.). RAE-ASALE. 2021. Retrieved 22 April 2022. 14. tr. Impartir una lección, pronunciar una conferencia o charla. 15. tr. Recibir una clase. Ayer dimos clase de matemáticas. 16. tr. Dicho de un alumno: Recitar la lección.
^"Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla (Ó Dónaill): ar ball". www.teanglann.ie.
^"nimio, nimia". Diccionario de la lengua española (in Spanish) (23 ed.). RAE-ASALE. 2021. Retrieved 22 April 2022.
^Renshaw, Steve; Ihara, Saori (2000). "A Tribute to Houei Nojiri". Archived from the original on December 6, 2012. Retrieved November 29, 2011.
^. Archived from the original on December 17, 2007. Retrieved June 12, 2007.
^Bathrobe. . cjvlang.com. Archived from the original on July 20, 2011. Retrieved November 29, 2011.
^Ronnie Ferguson, A linguistic history of Venice, 2007, ISBN882225645X, p. 284
Further reading
Sheidlower, Jesse (1 November 2005). "The Word We Love To Hate". Slate.
Leithauser, Brad (14 October 2013). "Unusable Words". The New Yorker.
Schulz, Kathryn (7 April 2015). What Part of "No, Totally" Don't You Understand?. The New Yorker.
External links
Look up autoantonym in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Look up Appendix:English contranyms or Appendix:English contranyms in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
For a list of words relating to Auto-antonyms, see the English contranyms category of words in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Contranyms by language in Wiktionary
List of auto-antonyms
January 20, 2023
auto, antonym, enantiodrome, redirects, here, jungian, principle, equilibrium, enantiodromia, auto, antonym, autantonym, also, called, contronym, antagonym, among, other, terms, word, with, multiple, meanings, senses, which, reverse, another, example, word, cl. Enantiodrome redirects here For the Jungian principle of equilibrium see Enantiodromia An auto antonym or autantonym also called a contronym 1 or antagonym among other terms is a word with multiple meanings senses of which one is the reverse of another For example the word cleave can mean to cut apart or to bind together This phenomenon is called enantiosemy 2 3 enantionymy enantio means opposite antilogy or autantonymy An enantiosemic term is necessarily polysemic Contents 1 Nomenclature 2 Linguistic mechanisms 3 Examples 3 1 English 3 2 Other languages 3 2 1 Nouns 3 2 2 Verbs 3 2 3 Adverbs 3 2 4 Agent nouns 3 2 5 Adjectives 3 2 6 In translation 4 See also 5 References 6 Further reading 7 External linksNomenclature EditAn auto antonym is alternatively called an antagonym contronym contranym enantiodrome enantionym Janus word after the Roman god Janus who is usually depicted with two faces 1 self antonym antilogy or addad Arabic singular didd 4 5 Linguistic mechanisms EditThis section has multiple issues Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page Learn how and when to remove these template messages This section needs additional citations for verification Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources Unsourced material may be challenged and removed Find sources Auto antonym news newspapers books scholar JSTOR February 2020 Learn how and when to remove this template message This section possibly contains original research Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations Statements consisting only of original research should be removed May 2020 Learn how and when to remove this template message Learn how and when to remove this template message Some pairs of contronyms are true homographs i e distinct words with different etymology which happen to have the same form For instance cleave separate is from Old English cleofan while cleave adhere is from Old English clifian which was pronounced differently Michael Jackson s Bad a song and an album popularized the slang meaning of bad as good citation needed Other contronyms are a form of polysemy but where a single word acquires different and ultimately opposite definitions For example sanction permit or penalize bolt originally from crossbows leave quickly or fix immobilize fast moving rapidly or unmoving Some English examples result from nouns being verbed in the patterns of add lt noun gt to and remove lt noun gt from e g dust seed stone Denotations and connotations 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 awful pompous and artificial with the meaning rendered in modern English of awe inspiring majestic and ingeniously designed 6 Negative words such as bad 7 and sick sometimes acquire ironic senses referring to traits that are impressive and admired if not necessarily positive that outfit is bad as hell lyrics full of sick burns Some contronyms result from differences in varieties of English For example to table a bill means to put it up for debate in British English while it means to remove it from debate in American English where British English would have shelve which in this sense has an identical meaning in American English To barrack in Australian English is to loudly demonstrate support while in British English it is to express disapproval and contempt Some words contain simultaneous opposing or competing meanings in the same context rather than alternative meanings in different contexts examples include blend words such as coopetition meaning a murky blend of cooperation and competition frenemy meaning a murky blend of friend and enemy glocalization etc These are not usually classed as contronyms but they share the theme of containing opposing meanings In Latin sacer has the double meaning sacred holy and accursed infamous Greek dhmioyrgos gave Latin its demiurgus from which English got its demiurge which can refer either to God as the creator or to the devil depending on philosophical context In some languages a word stem associated with a single event may treat the action of that event as unitary so in translation it may appear contronymic For example Latin hospes can be translated as both guest and host In some varieties of English borrow may mean both borrow and lend Examples EditEnglish Edit Cleave can mean to cling or to split apart 1 8 Clip can mean attach or cut off 1 Dust can mean to remove dust cleaning a house or to add dust e g to dust a cake with powdered sugar 1 8 Fast can mean without moving fixed in place holding fast also as in steadfast or moving quickly 1 8 Obbligato in music can refer to a passage that is either obligatory or optional 9 Oversight can mean accidental omission or error or close scrutiny and control Peruse can mean to consider with attention and in detail or look over or through in a casual or cursory manner 10 11 Ravel can mean to separate e g threads in cloth or to entangle 12 Sanction can mean approve or penalize Table can mean to discuss a topic at a meeting British English or to postpone discussion of a topic American English 13 Other languages Edit This section needs additional citations for verification Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources Unsourced material may be challenged and removed Find sources Auto antonym news newspapers books scholar JSTOR April 2021 Learn how and when to remove this template message Nouns Edit The Korean noun 앞 ap may mean either future or past distinguished by context Verbs Edit The German verb ausleihen the Dutch verb lenen the Polish verb pozyczyc the Russian verb odolzhit odolzitʹ the Finnish verb lainata and the Esperanto verb prunti can mean either to lend or to borrow with case pronouns and mention of persons making the sense clear The verb stem conveys that a lending and borrowing event is occurring and the other cues convey who is lending to whom This makes sense because anytime lending is occurring borrowing is simultaneously occurring one cannot happen without the other The Romanian verb a inchiria the French verb louer and the Finnish verb vuokrata 14 mean to rent as the lessee does as well as to let as the lessor does The Swahili verb kutoa means both to remove and to add The Chinese word 大败 it means both be defeated and to defeat The Persian verb چیدن cidan means both to pluck and to arrange i e by putting objects down In Spanish dar basic meaning to give when applied to lessons or subjects can mean to teach to take classes or to recite depending on the context 15 The Indonesian verb menghiraukan and mengacuhkan can mean to regard or to ignore The Indonesian Malay adjective usah can mean required or discouraged Adverbs Edit Hindi कल and Urdu کل kal kel may mean either yesterday or tomorrow disambiguated by the verb in the sentence Irish ar ball can mean both a while ago and in a little bit later on 16 Agent nouns Edit The Italian Spanish and French cognates ospite huesped and hote respectively also can mean host or guest The three words derive from the Latin hospes which also carries both meanings Adjectives Edit The Latin sinister lit left meant both auspicious and inauspicious within the respective Roman and Greek traditions of augury 17 The negative meaning was carried on into French and ultimately English 18 Latin nimius means excessive too much It maintained this meaning in Spanish nimio but it was also misinterpreted as insignificant without importance 19 minh means among other things bright clear from Sino Vietnamese 明 and dead gloomy from 冥 Because of this the name of the dwarf planet Pluto is not adapted from 冥王星 as in Chinese Japanese and Korean 20 21 22 In translation Edit Seeming auto antonyms can occur 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 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 23 See also EditSkunked term onym Oxymoron ihamReferences Edit a b c d e f Nym Words gt Autoantonyms www fun with words com Retrieved 2016 09 22 Zuckermann Ghil ad 2003 Language Contact and Lexical Enrichment in Israeli Hebrew Palgrave Macmillan pp 11 77 where enantiosemy is mentioned along with auto opposite Liberman Anatoly 25 September 2013 Etymology gleanings for September 2013 Oxford Etymologist Oxford University Press Retrieved 25 September 2013 The coexistence of two opposite meanings in a word is called enantiosemy and the examples are rather numerous Addad a study of homo polysemous opposites in Arabic Retrieved 2 August 2011 Gall Nick Antagonyms Retrieved 2 August 2011 O Toole Garson 31 October 2012 St Paul s Cathedral Is Amusing Awful and Artificial Quote Investigator Retrieved 22 January 2015 Darryl McDaniels Joseph Simmons for Run DMC 1986 Peter Piper CD Vol Raising Hell Profile Records He s the big bad wolf in your neighborhood not bad meaning bad but bad meaning good a b c Herman Judith 15 June 2018 25 Words That Are Their Own Opposites mentalfloss com Retrieved 2022 09 10 Obbligato Definition of PERUSE www merriam webster com Retrieved 28 June 2020 to EFFECT Janus Words www merriam webster com Retrieved 28 June 2020 to EFFECT The Canadian Oxford dictionary 2nd ed Oxford University Press 2004 p 1283 ISBN 9780195418163 entangle disentangle unravel Barber Katherine ed 2004 Canadian Oxford Dictionary Second ed Don Mills Ontario Oxford University Press Canada p 1580 ISBN 9780195418163 sanakirja org Archived from the original on 2021 11 26 dar Diccionario de la lengua espanola in Spanish 23 ed RAE ASALE 2021 Retrieved 22 April 2022 14 tr Impartir una leccion pronunciar una conferencia o charla 15 tr Recibir una clase Ayer dimos clase de matematicas 16 tr Dicho de un alumno Recitar la leccion Focloir Gaeilge Bearla o Donaill ar ball www teanglann ie M Horatius Piscinus On Auguries sinister adj www etymonline com nimio nimia Diccionario de la lengua espanola in Spanish 23 ed RAE ASALE 2021 Retrieved 22 April 2022 Renshaw Steve Ihara Saori 2000 A Tribute to Houei Nojiri Archived from the original on December 6 2012 Retrieved November 29 2011 Planetary Linguistics Archived from the original on December 17 2007 Retrieved June 12 2007 Bathrobe Uranus Neptune and Pluto in Chinese Japanese and Vietnamese cjvlang com Archived from the original on July 20 2011 Retrieved November 29 2011 Ronnie Ferguson A linguistic history of Venice 2007 ISBN 882225645X p 284Further reading EditSheidlower Jesse 1 November 2005 The Word We Love To Hate Slate Leithauser Brad 14 October 2013 Unusable Words The New Yorker Schulz Kathryn 7 April 2015 What Part of No Totally Don t You Understand The New Yorker External links Edit Look up autoantonym in Wiktionary the free dictionary Look up Appendix English contranyms or Appendix English contranyms in Wiktionary the free dictionary For a list of words relating to Auto antonyms see the English contranyms category of words in Wiktionary the free dictionary Contranyms by language in Wiktionary List of auto antonyms Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Auto antonym amp oldid 1131166671, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,
