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Converse (semantics) In linguistics, converses or relational antonyms are pairs of words that refer to a relationship from opposite points of view, such as parent/child or borrow/lend. [1][2] The relationship between such words is called a converse relation. [2] Converses can be understood as a pair of words where one word implies a ...
Contronym. A contronym is a word with two opposite meanings. For example, the word cleave can mean "to cut apart" or "to bind together". This feature is also called enantiosemy, [1][2] enantionymy (enantio- means "opposite"), antilogy or autoantonymy. An enantiosemic term is by definition polysemic.
Opposite (semantics) In lexical semantics, opposites are words lying in an inherently incompatible binary relationship. For example, something that is male entails that it is not female. It is referred to as a 'binary' relationship because there are two members in a set of opposites. The relationship between opposites is known as opposition.
Antonyms are words with opposite or nearly opposite meanings. For example: hot ↔ cold, large ↔ small, thick ↔ thin, synonym ↔ antonym; Hypernyms and hyponyms are words that refer to, respectively, a general category and a specific instance of that category. For example, vehicle is a hypernym of car, and car is a hyponym of vehicle.
Types and examples. Oxymorons in the narrow sense are a rhetorical device used deliberately by the speaker and intended to be understood as such by the listener. In a more extended sense, the term "oxymoron" has also been applied to inadvertent or incidental contradictions, as in the case of "dead metaphors" ("barely clothed" or "terribly good").
Homonym. In linguistics, homonyms are words which are either homographs —words that have the same spelling (regardless of pronunciation)—or homophones —words that have the same pronunciation (regardless of spelling)—or both. [1] Using this definition, the words row (propel with oars), row (a linear arrangement) and row (an argument) are ...
Unpaired word. An unpaired word is one that, according to the usual rules of the language, would appear to have a related word but does not. [1] Such words usually have a prefix or suffix that would imply that there is an antonym, with the prefix or suffix being absent or opposite. If the prefix or suffix is negative, such as 'dis-' or -'less ...
When the antiphrasal use is very common, the word can become an auto-antonym, [3] having opposite meanings depending on context. For example, Spanish dichoso [ 4 ] originally meant "fortunate, blissful" as in tierra dichosa , "fortunate land", but it acquired the ironic and colloquial meaning of "infortunate, bothersome" as in ¡Dichosas moscas ...