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12 Words That Are Their Own Opposite by Giftedgreen: 8:22am On Apr 12, 2013
Contromyms are words that are their own meaning.
If you are one of those people that love to send mixed signals to everyone around them, then this article is for you. These types of people make you constantly wonder if they are angry or happy. Well, if you are in the business of leaving people confused all the time here are some words that you could add to your arsenal of ambiguity.
This concept should not be strange to Nigerians since we are used to government officials who say one thing this minute and say the exact opposite the next minute. It is not uncommon for the President to say he is fighting corruption one minute and the next minute he is granting amnesty to convicted criminals.

1. "To cleave" can mean "to cling" or "to split".
She cleaved his skull with an axe.
Could you cleave her tongue to the top of her mouth?

2. "To dust" can mean to remove dust (cleaning a house) or to add dust (dust a cake with powered sugar).
Could you dust the sitting room?
I want you to dust the cake with sugar.

3. "To fight with someone" can mean "to fight against someone" or "to fight alongside someone".
I suspect Obasanjo is fight with Buhari.

4. "Awful" can mean "worthy of awe" or "very bad"
That’s an awful color
It is going to cost an awful lot of money

5. "Off" can mean "deactivated" as in "to turn off", or it can mean "activated" as in "the alarm went off".
When did the television TV go off?
When did the alarm go off?

6. Help means ‘assist,’ unless you can’t help doing something, when it means ‘prevent.’
Commandant Shem could not help his stupidity
I want you to help Patience Jonathan with her English.

7. "Back" can mean "regressive" as in "to go back in time", or it can mean "progressive" as in "to push back a deadline".
If you can’t drive forward, try backing it in.
The Lecturer wants to move back the deadline.

8. "Impregnable" can mean "able to be impregnated" or "incapable of being entered".
My house is an impregnable fortress
The pad is impregnated with insecticide

9. "To overlook" can mean "to inspect" or "to fail to notice".
She seemed to have overlooked one important fact.

10. "Unpacked" can refer to a container with objects still in it, or a container with the objects removed.
Did you unpack the box I just brought in?
Yes, the box is still unpacked.

11. "To skin" means "to cover with skin" (as in to skin a drum) as well as "to strip or peel off" (as in to skin an animal).
Jacob is going to skin the drum and the goat.

12. "Apparent" can mean "obvious" or "seeming, but in fact not".
It was apparent from her face that she was really upset.
My parents were concerened at my apparent lack of enthusiasm for school

The contronym (also spelled “contranym”) goes by many names, including “auto-antonym,” “antagonym,” “enantiodrome,” “self-antonym,” “antilogy” and “Janus word” (from the Roman god of beginnings and endings, often depicted with two faces looking in opposite directions).

For example, in Latin sacer has the double meaning "sacred, holy" and "accursed, infamous", French hôte may mean either "host" or "guest". Italian ciao is a greeting that is translated as "hello" or "goodbye" depending on the context, and Swahili verb 'kutoa', meaning both "to remove" and "to add".

In Nigeria, anya in Idoma could mean both “welcome” and “goodbye”. Can you think of any contronym in a Nigerian language?

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Re: 12 Words That Are Their Own Opposite by Queendo(f): 8:38am On Apr 12, 2013
nice one

1 Like

Re: 12 Words That Are Their Own Opposite by sagytariusTM1: 9:15am On Apr 12, 2013
Nice one, op.

Here are some other ones:
Consult : To offer advice, or to obtain it
Flog : To promote persistently, or to criticize or beat
Finished: Completed, or ended or destroyed
Re: 12 Words That Are Their Own Opposite by Giftedgreen: 9:50am On Apr 12, 2013
sagytarius™:
Nice one, op.

Here are some other ones:
Consult : To offer advice, or to obtain it
Flog : To promote persistently, or to criticize or beat
Finished: Completed, or ended or destroyed

yeah. Flog and consult are definately among.

Can u tink of any in ur native language?

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